Summary

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's (EEOC) Charge Data System (CDS), focusing on whether: (1) EEOC was receiving accurate and complete data from CDS for administering and enforcing the Age Discrimination in Employment Act; and (2) CDS errors caused any age discrimination complaints to exceed the legislation's statute of limitations.

GAO found that: (1) an estimated 4.1 to 12.6 percent of CDS mandatory data fields in eight EEOC office files were erroneous, out-of-date, or missing, because EEOC inadequately verified the accuracy or completeness of data or failed to update the databases; (2) seven of the eight CDS inventories it reviewed did not coincide with the physical inventories, because EEOC either misclassified cases or gave them an incorrect status; and (3) although CDS errors affected reporting accuracy, they did not adversely impact age discrimination investigations or affect the statute of limitations for cases under investigation.