You know how vital the right controls are to catch unauthorized spending on corporate credit or purchasing cards. Someone ought to tell the feds. A new report from the Government Accountability Office found 41% of government spending on cards didn’t follow procedure – and much of it was fraudulent. Worse: For charges over $2,500, a full 48% were unauthorized or improperly documented.

The mystery charges ran the gamut from the possibly legit — like millions of dollars for computers and digital cameras — to the somewhat questionable (iPods).

These were the charges that really caught our eye:

•  Various U.S postal workers spent $14,000 on Internet dating sites. (Doesn’t everyone deserve to find love?)
• An Agriculture Dept. employee wrote more than $642k in “convenience checks” to her live-in boyfriend (Sounds convenient to us.)
• A State Dept. employee charged $360 worth of lingerie from the “Seduccion Boutique.” Supposedly, it was used during a drug enforcement training exercise in Ecuador. (We’re going to invoke the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.) 

What’s the craziest purchase you’ve seen an employee try to get approved?

Tags: Credit cards, Expense padding, Fraud, Internal controls, Purchasing cards