Half-dozen former city employees continued to receive health benefits after termination, according to the city’s annual audit.
Auditors took a sample of 25 terminated employees and found 6 continued to receive health benefits because the city failed to timely remove them from health benefits billing, according to the audit.
Mayor Jose “Joey” Torres’ administration took three steps as corrective measure to address the repeat audit finding. The city added another employee – Gary Johnson – to assist with benefits enrollment and termination.
The city’s division of personnel also plans to conduct training for division and department heads to properly file timely personnel forms upon termination of employees. “This training will mitigate the issue of late receipt of the Personnel Action Form resulting in late termination of benefits for the employee,” reads a corrective action plan from personnel director Abby Levinson.
In four instances employees were not terminated in a timely fashion “for no other reason than a lack of completing this task by the benefits clerk,” reads the action plan. That clerk will be disciplined for failing to fulfill job duties, according to the corrective action plan.
The city submitted corrective action plans for findings in the 2015 audit report to the Division of Local Government Services inside the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs (DCA).
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