057f3528_1997_articles__s__not_necessarily_contiguous_
[Date & reference] 1997-07-23 Electronic Telegraph CSA dogged by errors in payments By David Fletcher, Health Correspondent
NEARLY four out of 10 maintenance payents made by the Child Support Agency last year were for the wrong amounts, the National Audit Office said yesterday. Sir John Bourn, head of the office, said the level of wrong assessments by the agency was so high that he could not fully certify its accounts. However, the agency claimed that 87 per cent of its assessments were correct "to the last penny" when it did a check last March and it was now entering "a new era".Sir John said many of the errors were a legacy from mistakes made by the agency in previous years and that "significant progress" was now being made. Faith Boardman, chief executive, admitted that there was still much to do to improve the agency's performance but she said it was now dealing adequately with incoming work. It said in its annual report yesterday that absent parents paid nearly £400 million in child maintenance last year, an increase of one third on the previous year.
1997 articles
Extracts (not necessarily contiguous)