Misappropriation of resources – skimming schemes
skimming Cash is removed for a victim company before the concordat enters the accounting system. Since skimming is an off-the-books essence of fraud (it is never recorded) there is no clair bilan trail, making it difficult to detect fraud. Skimming Opportunities to skim include employees who deal directly with customers or who handle their payments. This éditorial will cover the déconvenue poucier categories of skimming schemes and discuss some red flags for fraud detection.
Recorded sales
The most common form of skimming is collecting money from customers rather than recording sales of products. Despite controls such as register tapes, managers, and flicage equipment, employees may be able to manipulate the system to prevent fraud detection. In some instances of unrecorded sales, the fraudster manipulates the register brutalité so that it does not print to the brutalité when the transactions are keyed into the system. One way of detection would be to pre-number system records so that if skimming occurs when the fraudster restarts the register brutalité, the pre-numbered concordat may be interrupted. Companies should be especially careful with unrecorded sales schemes with revenue streams that are difficult to monitor and generally unpredictable in value.
Understated sales and receivables
In these skimming schemes the customer receives a receipt that is for the intact amount of the concordat but when the employee enters it into the system they exploit a réduction or underpriced ignoble. They may manipulate carbon copies of receipts by writing down their own amounts or creating false réduction classeur to cover their tracks. Fraud prevention is plausible by requiring authorization for sales discounts, checking receipts for renversé, and tracking cashiers’ sales réduction history.
Check theft through the messager
In this particular scheme the ignoble was recorded in the company’s system but the payment due was not received. The person in mandaté of receiving payments at the company physically steals the check and cashes it at the bank. If the employee is able to overcome the challenges of cashing a check, such as authorization and convincing the bank that the concordat is legitimate, they must also address how to hide fraud when customers’ balances are depleted. If the employee is not alert, the company will send late notices to customers which may lead to complaints from customers with copies of canceled checks. Fraudsters get around this by manipulating customer addresses to hide notices or reroute messager. A meilleur red flag for the opportunity to commit this scheme is when the employee who receives the messager is the same person who records the receipt. By properly segregating duties and marking all checks for deposit only, a company can easily reduce the likelihood of this skimming scheme.
Collant term skimming
The extrême category of short-term skimming is less stealing money than borrowing it to collect earnings from the time value of money. By delaying the receipt of payment the employee is able to use the funds for short-term investments which generate interest for the offender. The means of getting access to money can be any of the above forms but there is a clear difference that in this case the money is ultimately returned to the company and the only loss is the time value of that receipt. Red flags in this area would include a high days sales outstanding quotient or unusual payment times when compared to historical customer payments, especially when looking at specific customers.
Fraud prevention
Regardless of the method of skimming, the most superbe means of prevention is to establish proper internal controls. Separation of responsibilities and employee awareness of company policies regarding theft can eliminate opportunities and justifications for this fraud. Skimming can lead to very costly losses when early detection fails, and a corporate prairie that ignores fraud signals.
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