The State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) commissioned the auditing and fiduciary company BDO AG to carry out direct checks on selected recipients of COVID-19 hardship assistance presenting a high risk of abuse. The Swiss Federal Audit Office (SFAO) examined BDO’s approach in 2023 and made two recommendations. In the current audit, it examined the implementation of the recommendations, the findings from BDO’s work and their use by SECO. The recommendations from the SFAO’s 2023 audit have been implemented.
SECO is working transparently with the cantons to address the violations and anomalies documented in the BDO report. While cases involving businesses that are in bankruptcy proceedings or have already been deleted from the commercial register are forwarded to the cantons for information purposes, there is no expectation of further investigations into abusive bankruptcy. These companies have already committed confirmed abuse of another COVID-19 financial assistance scheme, but an in-depth investigation could not be carried out because they failed to cooperate with the checks. This increases the risk of an abusive bankruptcy being deliberately used to evade checks and possible repayment claims.
The results of the checks carried out directly at the companies concerned also reveal further potential improvements in the design of hardship assistance: these relate to, among other things, unintentional overcompensation, i.e. support that would not have been necessary for the survival of the business and the payment of benefits to companies with low viability. Although legally permissible, such overcompensation is at odds with the objective of the assistance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","audit_category":[42],"audit_type":[51],"class_list":["post-42283","audit","type-audit","status-publish","hentry","audit_category-public-finances-and-taxes","audit_type-audit"],"acf":{"audit_lang":null,"audit_numbers":[{"audit_number":"25453"}],"audit_office":[1287],"audit_office_text":"","audit_date":"20260128","bgo":false,"keywords":"","audit_office_local":"SECO"},"yoast_head":"\n