Preventing and Detecting Employee Fraud


"A former bookkeeper of a Sussex N.B. corner drugstore lands in jail for stealing $250,000 from her employer. Another bookkeeper for a rural group that brought electricity to Alberta farms pleaded guilty to paying herself 20 times her normal wages and pilfering nearly $100,000 from the co-op's coffers. In Saskatoon, an employee with access to a company's direct-deposit payroll system earns 18 months in jail for overpaying herself 48 times within a span of four years, bilking her company of no less than $334,000.

How can these types of frauds be prevented in a small business? By making sure that basic controls are in place - such as division of duties, proper monitoring, and making use of elementary report capabilities of accounting software. Here's a timely article on the matter.