Treasury and Investment Management Committee.

AuthorCarter, Genevieve
PositionGFOA COMMITTEES

GFOA's Treasury and Investment Management (TIM) Committee focuses its efforts on the development of best practices, advisories, and resources related to cash management, banking relations, and investment practices of state and local governments. The committee most recently worked to develop additional resources related to reducing risk from fraud and how to establish better banking relationships.

Merchant Services. The Committee approved a new resource: Merchant Services Selection, which reflects the key tenets of GFOA's current Procurement of Financial Services best practice. Merchant Services Selection outlines the steps governments should consider when securing a merchant services provider and the types of questions governments should ask during this process. A related item is the Banking Services RFP Checklist, which governments should review when determining their overall banking services needs and developing an RFP, including merchant services. The committee is also expected to soon approve a longer piece on understanding the processes and decisions needed for accepting credit and debit cards as part of a government's receivables program.

Fraud Prevention. The committee also approved a comprehensive document related to fraud in the treasury office. The Fraud Prevention in the Treasury Office resource combines older and updated GFOA documents, putting them together in one location. Several fraud-related topics are covered, including general recommendations to prevent internal and external fraud at your government. Recommendations are primarily related to the importance of having adequate internal controls to prevent fraud and ensuring that there are systems in place to keep the same employee from receiving, depositing, and reconciling funds. For payables, the basis for many of the recommendations rests on the same foundation as receivables--making sure the government has set policies and procedures related to the authorization, execution, and reconciliation of payments. Fraud Prevention in the Treasury Office also recommends that governments use services such as positive pay for checks and ACH payments, know how many bank accounts exist at area banks, determine if all the accounts are needed, and have up-to-date security measures in place when sharing and receiving information with their financial institutions.

A separate resource on Preventing Vendor Fraud was developed as a companion piece to the general Fraud Prevention Resource...

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