EBA Odesa General Membership Meeting with the State Audit Service of Ukraine

15/ 08/ 2019

Listen to online Stop     On August 15, ЕBA Odesa office held an open-dialogue meeting with the leadership of the Southern Office of the State Audit Service of Ukraine. The points of discussion were as follows: the modernization of state financial control and practical aspects of business entities’ audit. Oleh Muratov, Head of the Southern Office of the State Audit Service of Ukraine, summarizing the work for the first half of 2019, said the Southern Office was among the top five best inter-regional territorial bodies and administrations in the regions – judging by the overall assessment of state financial control measures effectiveness. Talking about the further development of the Service, the Office leader spoke about the audit of investment projects and international technical assistance, the audit of information technologies’ exercise, etc. Olexandr Vasyliev, the Head of Procurement monitoring department, focused on monitoring development, implementation of electronic system Prozorro and audit of public procurements. Indeed, at the end of 2018, the State Audit Service managed to fully implement the amendments to the Law of Ukraine “On Public Procurements”. The service received a new function - procurement monitoring, and at the same time the special account in ProZorro system. There is a special system of risk indicators that automatically look for suspicious purchases. Now there are 35 indicators, but their number may vary. In particular, the violations of the bidding procedure, lack of authority of the bidder, deficiency of digital signatures, excess of the review time, omission of a concluded contract, lack of uploaded tender documents and description of the procurement subject, a large number of lots in the tender and so on. During the seven months of 2019, the auditors of Southern Office monitored 358 procurement procedures totaling UAH 2.8 bln. Сonsequence of violations in this area on UAH 432 mln. were prevented by biddings’ canceling and contracts’ breaking. EBA members asked questions about independence of the audit results preparing, the objectivity of unscheduled field inspections (audits of uncontrolled objects) on the request of the investigator or prosecutor, counter-verification procedures, bringing to liability in the procurement field. The participants were also interested in measures that should be taken to prevent offenses and how to protect the honest business from unconscientious counterparties. The State Audit Offices leadership showed openness and willingness to communicate with business. Hope this dialogue encourage entrepreneurs to follow all the necessary procedures, and the State Audit Office to conduct more transparent audit, and facilitate the further development of public procurement as a whole.

On August 15, ЕBA Odesa office held an open-dialogue meeting with the leadership of the Southern Office of the State Audit Service of Ukraine. The points of discussion were as follows: the modernization of state financial control and practical aspects of business entities’ audit.

Oleh Muratov, Head of the Southern Office of the State Audit Service of Ukraine, summarizing the work for the first half of 2019, said the Southern Office was among the top five best inter-regional territorial bodies and administrations in the regions – judging by the overall assessment of state financial control measures effectiveness. Talking about the further development of the Service, the Office leader spoke about the audit of investment projects and international technical assistance, the audit of information technologies’ exercise, etc.

Olexandr Vasyliev, the Head of Procurement monitoring department, focused on monitoring development, implementation of electronic system Prozorro and audit of public procurements. Indeed, at the end of 2018, the State Audit Service managed to fully implement the amendments to the Law of Ukraine “On Public Procurements”. The service received a new function – procurement monitoring, and at the same time the special account in ProZorro system. There is a special system of risk indicators that automatically look for suspicious purchases. Now there are 35 indicators, but their number may vary. In particular, the violations of the bidding procedure, lack of authority of the bidder, deficiency of digital signatures, excess of the review time, omission of a concluded contract, lack of uploaded tender documents and description of the procurement subject, a large number of lots in the tender and so on. During the seven months of 2019, the auditors of Southern Office monitored 358 procurement procedures totaling UAH 2.8 bln. Сonsequence of violations in this area on UAH 432 mln. were prevented by biddings’ canceling and contracts’ breaking.

EBA members asked questions about independence of the audit results preparing, the objectivity of unscheduled field inspections (audits of uncontrolled objects) on the request of the investigator or prosecutor, counter-verification procedures, bringing to liability in the procurement field. The participants were also interested in measures that should be taken to prevent offenses and how to protect the honest business from unconscientious counterparties. The State Audit Office’s leadership showed openness and willingness to communicate with business. Hope this dialogue encourage entrepreneurs to follow all the necessary procedures, and the State Audit Office to conduct more transparent audit, and facilitate the further development of public procurement as a whole.