The Court of Auditors once again pinpointed the accounts of the family branch of Social Security on Friday, estimating at 5.5 billion euros “the amount of errors not corrected by internal control actions”. “5.5 billion euros in undue payments but also in benefits wrongly not paid were noted at the end of 2023, which will never be regularized”underlined the Court in a press release.
“Errors linked to data taken into account to pay benefits” represent “7.4% of the amount of benefits”, notes the Court in its annual report on the accounts of the general Social Security system. They concern in particular the RSA, the activity bonus and housing assistance. “In particular, a quarter of the amounts paid under the RSA are tainted by errors”she emphasizes.
She therefore declares herself “unable to certify” the accounts of the National Family Allowance Fund (CNAF) for 2023. Last year, the Court was even more severe, “refusing to certify” the accounts for the 2022 financial year, due to a “amount much too high” of errors, of 5.8 billion euros.
An error detection problem
She “recognizes the efforts made by the CNAF” last year, but “amount of uncorrected errors” stay “always high”. “The network’s error detection capacity remains much lower than the risk induced by the insufficient reliability of the data declared by beneficiaries”she emphasizes.
“The CNAF asks beneficiaries to declare their resources quarterly, and there are many errors by beneficiaries in these declarations, in particular for the activity bonus”we argue at the CNAF.
The establishment of the “solidarity at the source”from the end of 2024, should make it possible to “significantly reduce the risk” of errors, Nicolas Grivel, its general director, explained to Agence France-Presse, since the declarations will be pre-filled.
The family branch carried out a fraud assessment in 2023, as it does every two years. According to the Court of Auditors, potential fraud “represents 4.9% of legal benefits paid” by the CNAF, or 3.90 billion euros, up 39% compared to the previous assessment in 2021. “The RSA, the activity bonus, and housing assistance” are the “services most susceptible to fraud”she notes.
The Court has “certified with reservation” the 2023 accounts of the other branches of Social Security. Health Insurance has extended its approach to estimating fraud (in particular to dentists and specialist doctors), which resulted in a range between 1.4 and 1.9 billion over a scope covering less than a third of its expenses, according to the Court.