KADUNA ELECTRIC FRONTLINE FEBRUARY EDITION

We’re Proactive in Tackling Fraud – Team Lead, Audit

Yusuf Mohammed is the Team Lead, Audit Unit.  In this interview with our staff he reveals his plans to achieve his mandate of cost reduction while getting value for every penny spent. He talked about his achievements in 2017 and how he intends to surpass all that in the New Year. Read on…

CCD:  Yusuf Mohammed Adebayo as the Team Lead, Audit what was your unit mandated to achieve?

YA: The main object of the audit unit is to ensure that everything we do in the company is in compliance with the rules, regulation and management policies of the company.

 CCD: In 2017, how would you rate yourself in terms of how much you were able to achieve?

YA: We are all aware that the company policy is being reworked; we are now at the final stage. Naturally, our audit program is expected to align with the company policy, NERC regulations and other financial regulations in line with our industry practice.

We work with what serves as our Holy book, which is a compilation of every audit requirement of the entire department. What this means is that if an Auditor was to audit Corporate Communications department (CCD), there are things he is expected to look out for based on the requirement as stated in the Manual guiding us.

For a department like Corporate Communications, which might have entered a contract with print media in which the agreement states that a message or an advert should be carried at a particular time and at an agreed number of times.

An auditor assigned to a department like that is expected to look out for the following:

Did CCD enter into proper agreement with them, at what rate, time, and number of slots?  Are these in conformity with what the organization delivered?

When we get an invoice from the media house, all the aforementioned will equally be checked. This is similar in other departments. For instance, a department wants to pay for a transformer that has just been serviced; the auditor would have to get a confirmation that the service received is okay before he approves any payment.

CCD: How well would you say that you have been able to achieve what this unit was setup to do?

YA: In 2017, without scoring ourselves too high, I would say 80% because in everything that we did, we ensured that we got value for money.

 In 2017, management started funding the Area Offices; we followed through to ensure that all those monies gave value to the company.

That was why all the projects awarded were inspected before payment was made. There have been situations where we have asked contractors to go back to site to make corrections before payments were made.

In 2017, we ensured the salary audit was properly done; the addition and the subtraction as employees come and go. Others include cash analysis, which has already commenced in the New Year.  This is to ensure that all collections delivered to management is exactly what was collected.

CCD: What are your plans for the New Year?

YA: What I intend to do especially in 2018 is what we call
“Rapid Response”. If you look at our outfit today, you will see that we are all dressed alike; we are just coming from Kawo Cash Office, where we conducted an on the spot cash count. This is in line with the company’s policy and we intend to continue in that manner.

The purpose is to have an on the spot view of what is happening in the cash offices and to detect mismanagement. This has started yielding results because before the end of the first week of every month all reports on cash activities from all Area Offices must be submitted.

The Cash Offices receive money daily, and they deposit what they collect at the bank. Audit doesn’t get to see the statement until end of the month. What now happens is, immediately we receive the statement, every auditor goes to each area office to check the transactions one-by-one, cashier-by-cashier, day to day so at the end of three to four days you would be able to give a comprehensive report on each area office. All the findings should have been compiled and sent to management by the first week.

The purpose of this is to make sure that collections are being monitored closely, and also to ensure that every single Kobo collected has been remitted. 

CCD: How specifically would you say that your role as an auditor impacts on the business?

YA: Our job generally is to keep everybody on their toes because a lot of people have the misconception that Audit only acts when there is a fraud case.

We are more proactive than reactionary in approach in ensuring accountability in the system. 

We also ensure that every aspect of the business acts in accordance with rules of the business.

For 2018, we have a plan to visit area offices at the end of every month to look at units under Marketing Department, example, Customer Care to check their customer complaints/resolution handling process.  We will start by looking out for the complaints, how many complaints do they receive, how soon are they resolved, what do they do to unresolved complaints. This is part one of core areas of responsibilities and not just going after fraudulent cases.

CCD: Investigating fraud cases is synonymous with Audit Unit; tell us how you have been managing it?

YA: Yes. But you will notice that you don’t get to hear much about fraud cases these days because a lot of people now know that Auditors can pay them unannounced visits. Today, for instance, we went to Kawo Service Center without prior announcement.

Mobility is a constraint, because as auditors, we are ready to move from here to Gusau this morning. That is one of the reasons why we would concentrate on place like Kaduna for instance.

CCD: Are there measure put in place by Audit Unit to prevent the occurrence of fraud?

YA:  One of our proactive measures in the year 2018 is paying unscheduled visits to service centers. The visit to Kawo will send a signal to Rigasa and other Service Centers, thereby putting everybody on their toes.

CCD: You just mentioned mobility as one of the challenges in carrying out your task, are there any other challenges that make the job difficult?

YA: Yes, processing my team’s report is difficult because they don’t have Laptops; anytime they have to write a report they write it on paper (manually), they would have to look for the assistance of a friend before they can send their report. Typically, an audit report is not supposed to be seen by third party; if the report must be made public, then management would do it. 

CCD: How have you been managing all these despite the challenges?

YA: I have been squeezing them that they should find a way of typing the report and the confidentiality must not be breached, yes that is the truth. 

CCD: Some people allege that there are no penalties for those who are found to have committed fraud? What’s your take on this?

YA: That is not true. At least I know of a recent case in Sokoto where people were sacked for fraud related cases, the same for Gusau. We have just concluded the investigation into a fraud case that was reported in November.

These cases are reported either by outsiders or staff. When we get such reports, there are so many strategies that we adopt in investigating them. Our job is similar to that of a police officer, we are not expected to discuss our strategies so that people would not devise a way to circumvent it.  The unit is composed of people with varied knowledge on different aspects of the company’s business and can carry out a thorough investigation. The only constraint to completing an investigation within record time is the mobility issue I mentioned earlier.

CCD: If you are not working as an Auditor how do you relax?

YA: I listen to a lot of jazz music. I read a lot and sometimes I play Badminton in the office or outside the office. I have a Badminton court in my house so most of the time I play it with my kids.