Government employees stripped of purchase cards

Monday 12 August 2019

Government employees have been stripped of their purchase cards for “unauthorised spending” on at least six occasions in the past two years.

The news came in response to a request made under the Freedom of Information (FOI) Law, and explained that there are over 800 cards currently in use – each with role-specific limits.

Responding to a question over the number of cards that had been revoked as a result of “unauthorised spending”, the reply stated that it would take too long to investigate records for all departments, as “the reason for cancellation of a purchase card is not held centrally.” 

However, available records showed that staff had to surrender their purchase cards on at least six occasions over the past two years: four in 2018 and two in 2019.

Pictured: The cards were revoked for "non-fraudulent anomalies", government officials said.

Government officials described the cards as having been revoked for “non-fraudulent anomalies”, telling Express that this largely referred to incidents “where cardholders exceeded the daily per person limit, or where cardholders inadvertently used the cards to pay for online purchases of personal items.”

“All of these payments were subsequently repaid,” they added.

The average amount of each transaction was £16.30, with the overall refund figure totalling just short of £100.

Government officials have come under increased scrutiny for their spending in recent years, particularly following the 2016 flights scandal, which saw two civil servants come under fire for spending almost £15,000 on a business class trip to a five-day mining conference in South Africa.

Then in 2017, Express revealed that one of Jersey’s most high-profile politicians – former Treasury Minister Senator Philip Ozouf – had to repay more than £11,000 spent on his purchase card.

Between 2014 and 2016, the Senator spent £52,745.74 on his purchase card, with more than a fifth of that used to pay for goods and services, including books, flights, taxis, medical expenses, clothes and an iPad, which he later refunded.