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2012 discharge: European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA)

2013/2238(DEC)

The Committee on Budgetary Control adopted the report by Petri SARVAMAA (EPP, FI) in which it recommended the European Parliament to grant discharge to the Executive Director of the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority in respect of the implementation of the Authority's budget for the financial year 2012.

Noting that the Court of Auditors stated that it has obtained reasonable assurances that the annual accounts of the Authority for the financial year 2012 are reliable, and that the underlying transactions are legal and regular, Members approved the closure of the Authority’s accounts. They made, however, a number of recommendations that needed to be taken into account when the discharge is granted, in addition to the general recommendations that appear in the draft resolution on performance, financial management and control of EU agencies.

  • Financing, budget and financial management: Members noted that budget monitoring efforts during the financial year 2012 resulted in an overall budget implementation rate of 90.63%. They noted with concern that the payment appropriations execution rate was 67.21%.
  • Carryovers: Members regretted that the carry-over of committed appropriations to 2013 was very high for title III (operational expenditure) at 79% of total appropriations even if they acknowledged that this is mainly the result of the complexity and of the lengthy duration of one IT procurement procedure. They also regretted that one contract related to the design of a financial database was subdivided into four lots of EUR 60 000 each, which were all directly awarded to two companies. According to the Members, an open or restricted procedure should have been applied and that the related commitments and payments are thus irregular.

Members also made a series of observations on transfers, procurement and recruitment procedures as well as comments on internal controls.

Lastly, they acknowledged that the Authority adopted its Ethics Rules in 2011 and established specific provisions for its Stakeholders Groups and Board of Appeal to handle potential conflicts of interests. They called on the Authority to inform the discharge authority whether it intends to review its Ethic Rules on the basis of the Commission's Guidelines.