Reports

We found that as of November 30, 2022, FSA obligated nearly 100 percent of the $161.1 million in appropriations it received for pandemic assistance student aid administration funds. Nine FSA business units obligated approximately $157.8 million (98 percent) of the total pandemic assistance student aid administration funds, with one business unit, the Next Gen FSA Program Office, accounting for 78 percent of the obligations. The pandemic assistance student aid administration funds were used for personnel compensation and benefits, information technology systems and services contracts, and...

We audited the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Office of Native American Programs’ (ONAP) coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19) recovery programs. We performed this audit to provide HUD with insight and a nationwide perspective on the challenges that grantees experienced with those programs. Our audit objectives were to identify 1) the information, guidance, and training HUD provided to the grantees for the ONAP COVID-19 recovery programs and 2) the challenges that grantees faced in implementing and using program-provided funding. HUD provided information, guidance...

Pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Act, the CFPB’s Office of Consumer Response collects, monitors, and responds to consumer complaints on financial services and products. The CFPB uses these consumer complaints to help inform the agency’s supervision activities, enforce federal consumer financial laws, and write rules and regulations. With an increase in consumer complaints as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Consumer Response faces an operational risk with respect to the timeliness in which it can respond to consumer complaints. We plan to assess the effectiveness of the CFPB’s processes for reviewing and responding to consumer complaints. 

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Board established the PPPLF to extend credit to financial institutions that originate loans through the U.S. Small Business Administration’s guaranteed Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), taking the PPP loans as collateral. The PPPLF, managed by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis and operated out of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks, distributed billions of dollars to eligible lenders. We will assess the effectiveness of internal controls to (1) determine lender eligibility, extend credit, and process repayments and (2) identify at-risk advances, handle instances of nonpayment, and detect and mitigate fraud. We also plan to assess the extent to which the Federal Reserve System coordinates with the U.S. Small Business Administration to determine lender eligibility, recover losses due to nonpayment, and detect and mitigate fraud.

We audited Nationstar Mortgage, LLC’s (doing business as Mr. Cooper (Nationstar)) compliance with the Federal Housing Administration’s (FHA) requirements for providing loss mitigation assistance to borrowers after their COVID-19 forbearance ended. We concurrently conducted a nationwide audit of servicers’ compliance with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) COVID-19 loss mitigation requirements (HUD Office of Inspector General (OIG) Report 2023-KC-0005). This audit complements that audit by examining how a single provider, Nationstar, provided loss mitigation for...

We performed an audit of loan servicers’ compliance with the Federal Housing Administration’s (FHA) requirements for providing loss mitigation assistance to borrowers after their COVID-19 forbearance ended. We initiated the audit based on the large number of borrowers exiting forbearance, because the loss mitigation programs available to these borrowers were new and created a risk for both borrowers and the FHA insurance fund when servicers do not properly provide loss mitigation. Our audit objective was to determine whether servicers provided borrowers of FHA-insured loans proper loss...

The purpose of the audit is to determine whether the Florida Department of Education designed and implemented (1) application processes that adequately assessed nonpublic schools' eligibility for EANS funded services or assistance and complied with other applicable requirements and (2) oversight processes to ensure that EANS funded services or assistance were used for allowable purposes. 

This report presents the results of our survey on LEA experiences with using ESSER funds to purchase educational technology to continue student instruction during the coronavirus. The survey identified (1) types of educational technology that LEAs purchased with their ESSER funds, (2) challenges that LEAs experienced when using ESSER funds for educational technology, and (3) impact the educational technology had on student learning. The survey found that LEAs nationwide generally reported using ESSER funds to purchase educational technology to continue student instruction due to the...

The objective of the report is to compile SIGPR's audit products as well as lessons learned related to SIGPR's budget, jurisdiction, and hiring authority.