Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Controls over Parking-Lot Revenue

This is a State Auditor performance audit of MBTA parking-lot revenue controls for January 1, 2013 through December 31, 2013.

“This report details the audit objectives, scope, methodology, findings, and recommendations for the audit period, January 1, 2013 through December 31, 2013.”

Auditors looked at whether the MBTA was properly protecting and accounting for parking money and overseeing its parking contractor.

“The objective of our audit was to determine whether the MBTA was properly safeguarding and accounting for all parking-lot revenue and was efficiently and effectively administering its parking-management contract.”

Parking brought in tens of millions of dollars, so weak controls could mean public money was not fully protected or verifiable.

“During fiscal year 2013, LAZ reported collecting $42.3 million in parking revenue.”

If you use or fund the MBTA, this matters because parking revenue supports the transit system and should be protected from loss or poor tracking.

“The MBTA serves 175 communities, providing transit alternatives to almost 4.8 million people over an area of 3,200 square miles.”

The MBTA had weaknesses in how it controlled parking-cash keys and how it checked daily cash from Honor Box lots against actual parking use.

“The MBTA lacked the necessary controls to reconcile daily parking revenue at Honor Box parking lots.”

The MBTA had already ended the Honor Box cash system and said it was adding stronger key controls and considering ways to check parking-lot counts against revenue.

“Effective July 6, 2015, the MBTA replaced the Honor Box system with a system of pay-by-phone parking and monthly permits to eliminate the need to pay for parking with cash.”

The most serious concern was that weak key controls affected access to more than $22 million in cash collected at parking facilities.

“The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority did not properly safeguard keys that permitted access to more than $22 million in cash collected at its parking facilities.”

An Honor Box was a cash box where drivers put money into a numbered slot matching their parking space; reconciliation means comparing cars parked with money collected.

“These Honor Boxes contained numbered slots that corresponded to the numbered parking spaces in each lot.”