A civil servant was paid nearly €300,000 in overpayments after receiving duplicate salaries from two separate State bodies due to administrative errors, the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General has found.
The report says that despite being informed of the mistake by the official, the payments continued for several more years.
The report says an official of the Central Statistics Office (CSO) was seconded to another Government department in 2004, originally for a year and later permanently from 2006.
It says that following the permanent transfer the Government department commenced paying the salary of the official who had previously been on the payroll of the CSO.
However the report says that despite a clear agreement, the CSO continued to pay the official’s salary until 2012 due to a number of administrative errors. It says increments were also paid automatically by the CSO payroll system without approval from its personnel unit.
It says that the official to the CSO in November 2007 informing it that it was continuing to pay the salary despite no longer working for the organisation. The report says that the CSO did not address the matter.
“In October 2012, the official wrote again to the CSO informing it of the error and submitted a cheque for €120,000. The official indicated that any outstanding balance of the salary/overpayments would be repaid.”
The report says that at that stage the CSO personnel unit terminated the payment and acknowledged that the gross overpayment to the official stood at around €297,000.
“After taking account of tax, social insurance and other public contributions, the net amount overpaid to the official was €206,000. To date over €201,000 of the net overpayments to the official has been repaid and the CSO is seeking recovery of the remaining €4,800.
