US government investments in information technology projects valued at $8.7 billion need immediate attention because lower echelon administrators are not doing the job properly, a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Federal investments in IT have often resulted in multimillion dollar cost overruns and years-long schedule delays, with questionable mission-related achievements, the report warned.

“As of May 2015, 178 of the US government's 738 major investments in IT —totaling $8.7 billion — were in need of management attention due to their risk,” the report, released on Wednesday, said.

From October 2009 through December 2014, the GAO made 737 recommendations to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and agencies to improve IT management and oversight.

“As of January 2015, only about 23 percent of these had been fully implemented,” the GAO said.

The US government’s implementation of programs to improve IT acquisitions “has been inconsistent,” the GAO found.

The OMB established a process for holding face-to-face investment performance reviews called “TechStats” with different agencies, it said.

However, “as of 2013, less than 20 percent of at-risk investments across the government had undergone such reviews.”

The US government invests more than $80 billion annually in IT, the report noted. “However, these investments frequently fail, incur cost overruns and schedule slippages, or contribute little to mission-related outcomes,” it added.

In February 2015, the GAO added improving the management of IT acquisitions and operations to its high-risk list. It described the list as “agencies and program areas that are high risk due to their vulnerabilities to fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement, or are most in need of transformation.”

The Government Accountability Office is an independent, nonpartisan agency that works for Congress and investigates how the US federal government spends taxpayer dollars.