Page 1 GAO-24-107461 Improper Payments
Improper payments—those that should not have been made or were made in an
incorrect amount, including overpayments and underpayments—are an area of
persistent concern in the federal government. Since fiscal year 2003, cumulative
executive agency improper payment estimates have totaled almost $2.7 trillion.
In fiscal year 2023 alone, estimates of improper payments totaled almost $236
billion government-wide. While this total represented a decrease of about $11
billion from the prior fiscal year, certain federal agencies continue to report high
estimated improper payment rates of 10 percent or more for certain programs.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Supplemental Nutrition Assistance
Program (SNAP) is the largest federally funded nutrition assistance program. In
June 2024, USDA reported that an estimated 11.7 percent (or about $10.5 billion
of $90.1 billion in outlays not including disaster benefits, such as emergency
allotments from the pandemic) of SNAP benefits paid in fiscal year 2023 were
improper. This was an increase from the prior year estimate of 11.5 percent (or
about $8.8 billion of $76.0 billion in outlays not including disaster benefits, such
as emergency allotments from the pandemic) as reported on
PaymentAccuracy.gov. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Congress granted
states the option to suspend certain quality control regulatory requirements,
including those used to track and report improper payments. As a result, USDA
had incomplete datasets for fiscal years 2020 and 2021 and was unable to
estimate and report improper payment rates for SNAP for those years.
House Report 117-389, which accompanied the Legislative Branch
Appropriations Act, 2023 (Pub. L. No. 117-328, div. I, 136 Stat. 4459, 4913),
includes a provision for GAO to provide quarterly and annual reports through
fiscal year 2025 on its ongoing oversight of improper payments and
recommendations for legislative action or technical opportunities to improve
payment integrity. In this seventh quarterly report, we provide information on
USDA’s improper payment estimation process for SNAP and the guidance and
assistance it provides to state agencies. In addition, we describe oversight that
USDA and other entities provide related to states’ efforts to reduce improper
payments for SNAP.
• Developing and reporting improper payment estimates for SNAP involves a
two-tiered process. In the first tier, state agencies review household eligibility
determinations and benefit amounts to gather data on improper payments to
provide to USDA. In the second tier, USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service
(FNS) reviews states’ data to ensure that quality control regulatory
requirements were met.
U.S. Government Accountability Office
USDA’s Oversight of the
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
-24-107461
Report to the Subcommittee on Legislative Branch, Committee on Appropriations, House of
26, 2024
