How Can You Ensure Smooth Business Operations?
Fraud awareness training is important for HR to ensure that the businesses get the best returns on the money invested by them. The employees can be a part of a lot of misdemeanors if the company does not pay attention. Although you might have hired the most credible employees, there can be issues. This kind of risk is more serious in small businesses where employees might have salary issues and feel underpaid. They also feel that they are victims of undue job stress and don’t get opportunities as per their capabilities.
Hence, the IT and the HR staff of the SMB’s should be given fraud awareness training so that they can detect alarming signs in employees' behavior and stop their malicious acts in time.
There are many kinds of employee fraud:
Embezzlement
An employee might take home some money from your company without any kind of authorization. So, such theft does not show in company accounts as an employee loan. This can be done by company accountants who are in charge of company cash.
Using Sick Leaves
The employees might also use sick leaves to attend functions or parties. They might be perfectly alright and still abstain from work under the excuse of sickness. Worst of all, they could be moonlighting sitting at home, or attending an interview.
Changing Attendance Time
Employees might not be present at work or arrive late. But they can bribe someone to show that they were working during the time they were outside the office. These kinds of issues can cost a company a lot of money. Hence, HR should make note of them.
Extraordinary Spending
An employee has made sudden alterations to their lifestyle. This indicates that they are working for another company and sharing confidential information about your organization.
Too Much Secrecy
An employee does not want any manager to review their work because they are not doing anything or they are accessing undesirable sites on their PC. That’s why: They want their computer to be off the network.
Complaints From Coworkers
Frequent complaints are made about an employee as they come late to the office. They do not punch in when they arrive or forget to punch out when they leave. This means they are spending lesser time in the office than their attendance records indicate. Other employees observe such behavior and inform HR about it. These grievances should not be ignored by HR as mere grudges.
No Adherence To Rules
The access to sensitive information in the company should be controlled because if it falls into wrong hands, all hell can break loose. For example, accounts of clients of customers should not accessible to all. If an employee is accessing systems that require credentials, then it’s a red flag for them to pilfer company data. The accessibility rules should be the same for all employees.
Employee access to cubicles should be monitored. They should be checked at the time of leaving office premises because they could be stealing company files. In fact, under fraud awareness training, HR should be taught how to monitor surveillance cameras and record any unwanted employee activity.
Preventive Measures
Create A Structure Of Authority
During the allotment of duties, ensure that a single employee is not in charge of financial transactions. There should be a segregation of duties so that employee access can be easily monitored. When different people are managing the records, it’s not so easy to cover the tracks. On the other hand, with a hierarchy of financial roles, an employee would have to get an in-depth understanding to steal funds.
Take Control Of Check Issuance
The owner must oversee the process of check management. Any checks should not be issued without their signature. And they must have collaboration from the bank about their permission required for a check withdrawal for a larger amount.
They should also be notified about any checks where there is a discrepancy between the payee’s name and the details included in the records. In any case, they should be informed about all the checks that are issued on a single day to different payees.
A company can also conduct annual third-party audits so that any nefarious actions of accountants are discovered. Any large debit from the company account without any corresponding purchases can be found. Anyways, an unanticipated change in the lifestyle of a bookkeeper shows that they are doing something fishy.
This is how fraud awareness training can help a company in protecting its hard-earned money.
