COA tells Land Bank to stop outsourcing ATM cash loading

Following complaints that its automated teller machines (ATMs) were always out of cash, the Commission on Audit (COA) has called on Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) not to outsource cash loading tasks to a third party anymore.

In its 2017 annual audit report, the COA said the state-owned bank should “consider terminating the ATM outsourcing activities” of the unnamed service provider “at the end of the contract in August 2019.”

Auditors pointed out that the budget for outsourcing services could have been used to buy armored cars to deliver the cash.

The COA issued the recommendations after finding that the service provider did not have access to the LBP’s ATM monitoring facility to keep track of the status of the units.

It noted that in the National Capital Region’s 268 ATM units, downtimes lasted from 1.35 hours to as long as 15 days. —Vince F. Nonato