The Financial Accountability for Public Funds program promotes financial accountability for public funds throughout state government and provides Florida's citizens comprehensive information on the financial status of the state and how state funds are expended. The program also recovers and returns unclaimed property to owners.

The program fulfills its mission by delivering services through the Division of Accounting and Auditing and the Division of Unclaimed Property.
The Division of Accounting and Auditing has four bureaus and one office.

• The Bureau of Auditing provides assurance to the taxpayers of Florida by auditing disbursements, financial transactions, and contracts to ensure that funds are disbursed from the State Treasury in accordance with applicable laws, rules, and administrative policies.
• The Bureau of Financial Reporting provides the public with comprehensive information on the financial status of the state and its local governmental entities. The bureau collects and compiles financial data from local governments via the Local Governmental Electronic Reporting System. It is also responsible for the annual preparation of the state's Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR).
• The Bureau of State Payrolls pays state employees timely and accurately, properly reports and remits tax and retirement contributions and withholdings to all regulatory agencies, maintains official employee payroll records, conducts payroll related audits, and provides customer service. State employees can check their earnings statement and W-2 information online.
• The Bureau of Vendor Relations provides services related to accounting for and managing state funds. The bureau oversees the state's electronic funds transfer (EFT) program, provides multiple tax-related duties, and serves as the Vendor Ombudsman, which is responsible for vendor payment issues.
• The Office of Florida Financial Education provides state agencies and vendors with resources and effective instructional programs to enable them to have greater knowledge, skills, and responsibility for fiscal management and accurate reporting of the state's resources in order to provide services to the citizens of Florida.

The Division of Unclaimed Property holds money and securities, mostly from dormant accounts in financial institutions, insurance and utility companies, securities, and trust holdings. In addition to money and securities, unclaimed property includes tangible items such as watches, jewelry, coins, currency, stamps, historical items and other miscellaneous articles from abandoned safe deposit boxes. Unclaimed money is deposited into the state school fund, where it is used for public education. There is no statute of limitations and citizens have the right to claim their property any time at no cost.

The public can search for unclaimed property through the Division of Unclaimed Property's Florida Treasure Hunt website, which provides individuals the opportunity to discover and claim their own unclaimed property. The website also provides links to other sites that individuals can visit to search for unclaimed property. These sites include other states' unclaimed property programs, in-state resources such as the unclaimed refunds site for the Florida Prepaid College Program, and national resources such as the undelivered tax refunds site for the Internal Revenue Service.

The Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) provides Florida citizens and other interested parties with information about the state's financial condition.  The report includes a comprehensive presentation of the state's financial and operating activities, including financial statements, an independent auditor's report, and state-level statistical and economic data (e.g., revenues, expenditures, population, and state university enrollment).

The department maintains the Florida Accountability Contract Tracking System (FACTS), which is an online tool that provides a centralized, statewide contract reporting system. As part of this initiative, state agencies record their active contracts into the system. FACTS also contains contract images, financial information, and audit findings of all grant and contract documents, along with a query tool to provide users and the public with access to the information.

Replacing the State's Accounting and Cash Management Systems. The state's current accounting and cash management systems (CMS) have been performing these functions for over 30 years and are increasingly unable to meet the state's needs. The 2013 Legislature directed the department to contract with an independent third-party consulting firm to complete a study of the Florida Accounting Information Resource Subsystem (FLAIR) and provide a recommendation to replace or enhance it and include an assessment of the feasibility of implementing an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. The department established a project in 2014 to replace FLAIR and CMS with an ERP; the project is now called Florida PALM (Planning, Accounting, and Ledger Management).

The 2021 Legislature continued the FLAIR and CMS replacement and gave further direction in the Fiscal Year 2021-22 General Appropriations Act (Chapter 2021-36, Laws of Florida) and General Appropriations Act implementing bill (Chapter 2021-37, Laws of Florida). Among other provisions, these laws 

• direct the department to replace the main components of FLAIR and the cash management and accounting management components of CMS with an integrated enterprise system that allows the state to organize, define, and standardize its financial management business processes;
• prohibit the department from including in the replacement functionality that duplicates any of the other information subsystems of the Florida Financial Management Information System; or agency business processes related to any of the functions included in the Personnel Information System, Purchasing Subsystem, or Legislative Appropriations System/Planning and Budgeting Subsystem;
• require the department to implement a project governance structure that includes an executive steering committee comprised of the Chief Financial Officer or executive sponsor of the project, representatives of various units within the Department of Financial Services, representatives from the Executive Office of the Governor, representatives of selected state agencies, the executive sponsor of the Florida Health Care Connection System, and the State Chief Information Officer or designee;
• authorize the department, upon execution of an amendment to the software and system integrator contract that complies with statutes and designates a member of the Office of General Counsel as the contract manager, to submit quarterly budget amendments to release appropriated funds; such amendments shall include a detailed operational work plan and project spending plan that identifies all project work and costs budgeted for Fiscal Year 2021-22;
• require the operational work plan to include the project tasks to be completed by all state agencies that are necessary for remediation of their systems impacted by the PALM project, and the tasks and deliverables needed to retain the current historical reporting functionality provided by the FLAIR Information Warehouse and inclusive of PALM data;
• require the department to provide all agencies updated and fully detailed business process models that reflect the project's current phased implementation approach; and
• provide funds to competitively re-procure a private sector provider with experience in conducting independent verification and validation services of public sector enterprise resource planning information technology projects to provide independent verification and validation for the PALM project.

Unclaimed Property. The 2021 Legislature enacted Chapter 2021-144, Laws of Florida, to streamline the process for claiming unclaimed property and provide additional consumer protections. Among its provisions, the new law addresses the process used by licensed claimants' representatives (known as registrants) to gain access to the Department of Financial Services' unclaimed property database to seek authorization and claim property on behalf of potential claimants. The department must require registrants to use new forms, called Unclaimed Property Recovery Agreements or Unclaimed Property Purchase Agreements, when claiming unclaimed property. The department is required to adopt the forms by rule. To protect the interests of unclaimed property owners, the forms must include and disclose several items, including the fees and costs to be paid to the claimant's representative, the net dollar amount to be received by the claimant or seller, and identifying information of the claimant's representative.      

Other Reports
Department of Financial Services - Florida Accounting Information Resource Subsystem (FLAIR) and Selected Information Technology Controls - Information Technology Operational Audit, Auditor General Report No. 2021-131, February 2021.
Department of Financial Services - Florida Accounting Information Resource Subsystem (FLAIR) - Information Technology Operational Audit, Auditor General Report No. 2020-095, January 2020.
Department of Financial Services - Unclaimed Property Management Information System (UPMIS) - Information Technology Operational Audit, Auditor General Report No. 2018-210, June 2018.

Department of Financial Services - Florida Accounting Information Resource Subsystem (FLAIR) and Origami Risk Insurance Management System (Origami) - Information Technology Operational Audit, Auditor General Report No. 2018-025, October 2017.
Audits and Reviews, Division of Accounting and Auditing
Florida Comprehensive Annual Financial Report, Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 2020, Department of Financial Services, February 2021.
LOGER's Instruction Manual for Annual Financial Reports Fiscal Year 2019 and Beyond (Local Government Electronic Reporting), Department of Financial Services.
Reference Guide for State Expenditures, Department of Financial Services. 
Websites of Interest
National Association of Unclaimed Property Administrators
Claim for Lost, Stolen, or Destroyed United States Savings Bonds
Performance Information

Performance measures and standards for the department may be found in its Long Range Program Plan.

Chapters 17 (chief financial officer), 215 (financial matters of the state), 216 (planning and budgeting), 218 (financial matters for political subdivisions of the state), 717 (unclaimed property), and s. 20.121 (organization of the department), Florida Statutes.

Division of Accounting and Auditing, 850-413-5510
Website

Division of Unclaimed Property, 888-258-2253 or 850-413-5555
Website