Financial companies are amongst those likely to be targeted for incidents of employee fraud. Recent news that former state Senator Christopher Maselli was jailed for 27 months, for fraudulently obtaining $1.7 million, highlights that fraudulent behaviour is carried out by people from all areas of society.
The financial services industry recorded one of the highest losses to fraudsters amongst UK sectors, according to data released by the National Fraud Authority (NFA)*. Its Annual Fraud Indicator (AFI) found that £3.6 billion was lost from fraudulent activity, which is only a slight decrease on the 2010 figure of £3.8 billion. Despite utilising improved fraud prevention methods, card transaction losses accounted for £440 million, cheque fraud £30 million with on-line banking has recorded an increase of 14% equating to £60 million. Mortgage fraud stood at £1 billion and insurance at £2.1 billion. Following collaboration between the NFA and the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) a new inclusion to the AFI showed losses to SME’s employing less than 250 people contributed £780million toward fraudulent activity.
Banking is no longer the transparent financial service it was; the ever-changing environment in which they operate means that the regulatory problems struggle to be resolved: new issues emerge and old issues reappear in a different form. It remains imperative that companies utilise new technologies to assist with incident management and provide employees with an effective tool to quickly communicate events that may carry risks of loss or litigation. Greater emphasis must be placed on educational initiatives to enhance and promote the benefits of fraud prevention and detection systems within companies. As part of Expolink’s on-going commitment to helping businesses reduce the risk of fraudulent activity, it introduced a web-based Incident and Case Management solution that provides a comprehensive interface for data entry, reporting and investigative enquiries and much more.
Report Exec allows users to create, share and protect detailed records of incidents taking place within the company. Using the online reporting facility, financial organisations can immediately provide a tool to log unlimited reports of unusual activity anywhere in the world at anytime, whilst managing the flow of information to administrators far more efficiently. Complete with a comprehensive case management module, specific incidents can be investigated whilst powerful trend analysis properties help identify more serious circumstances.
It is hoped that the AFI statistics will push initiatives in the field of fraud prevention further for the financial sector. It is vital that companies work together and take action to prevent the increase in fraudulent activity. In the current economic climate, businesses need to work intelligently in all areas of loss prevention and improve efficiency to maintain a competitive edge.
(* Figures obtained from NFA)
Recent figures published by the British Retail Consortium (BRC) further confirm the need to protect your profits from retail theft. Your profits are in jeopardy if your products are not being paid for.
CCTV has long been used to combat crime and protect the safety of the public and the surly presence of security guards in shop doorways is a given on any shopping trip. Yet despite these wise, preventative measures the UK is amongst the three worst countries in the world for shrinkage due to retail theft.
The situation would be a lot worse had businesses not opted to safeguard their precious merchandise and in times of recession, spikes in crime are to be expected; but with £4.4bn worth of goods pilfered from shops across the country in 2010, this is not a trend that should be welcomed or seen as simply going with the territory. The British Retail Consortium said items including TVs, computer games and clothes totaling £375,342 were stolen from shelves every day last year and although instances of theft itself have decreased by 5.8% impact is compounded by the types of goods favoured by thieves; namely high-end products with luxury or branded qualities. The shift in criminal culture from lone thieves to more organised gangs further magnifies concern.
Perhaps even more worrying was the rise in staff theft. Over a third of losses in the UK retail industry were due to internal theft, 7% higher than the European average and rendering the UK the highest in the continent. Even an honest employee may be susceptible to temptation and without a deterrent culture instilled in your organisation such avaricious behaviour could go unchecked and unpunished. G4S Security Solutions claim that one in 10 retail employees (10%) has committed a crime or failed to report a colleague’s theft against their employer in the last 12 months. Further to this, the organization estimates 110,000 retail employees have consumed produce without paying for it and a further 30,000 haven’t reported friends or family failing to scan items at a self-scan checkout.
Technological advances in security contend with increasingly sophisticated point-of-sale and backroom fraud and with criminal networks sharing these tricks on line retailers must up the preventative stakes to stay in the game. It is challenge enough for businesses to prosper in a harsh economic climate; where preventative loss measures are available it would be foolhardy not to avail of them.
Contact us to find out how Expolink can help you protect your business from retail theft.
To receive our quarterly newsletter, with industry updates relevant to you, please fill in the Get InTouch form below.
The Bribery Bill, which was due to come into effect this April, has been delayed as part of the Government’s Growth Review, an effort to stimulate business performance in the private sector. Guidance on best practice for enforcing the bill is being supplied to businesses with the bill expected to be enforced three months later.
This deferment should not encourage businesses to rest on their laurels. The United Kingdom is ranked 20th in this year’s Transparency World Corruption Index, the world’s most credible domestic public sector corruption measure. Three quarters of the 180 countries listed were low scoring, including many G20 member states. The ever-increasing globalisation of business means that the successful implementation of the bill is vital for maintaining the credibility of UK and global business alike.
The Act creates a strict liability offence of failure by a commercial organisation to prevent payments of bribes by employees or others working on its behalf. With the onus of accountability shifting to corporate heads, no matter what size or sector your business, maintaining unequivocal control of your anti-bribery measures is fundamental to the protection of your staff and business. Responsibility is far-reaching and encompasses lack of preventative measures domestically and across the globe. Even if a CEO has no direct knowledge of the alleged bribery, culpability will be in their court.
Risk management and establishing a culture of intolerance to bribery and illegal activity must be prioritised in order to assure your organisation is adherent to the Act. Ensuring that staff have not only been informed of the policy but are comprehensively trained and sign off to this effect goes a long way toward achieving compliancy and peace of mind.
The gravitas that must be placed on compliance and the importance of avoiding ambiguous procedures cannot be stressed enough. At risk is your business, incurring unlimited fines, blacklisting from EU contracts and forfeiture of proceeds of illegal deals. The Act also increases the maximum jail term for bribery from seven to 10 years.
Dissemination of responsibility is paramount. Once a culture of anti-corruption has been established, the government recommends the appointment of one senior officer to oversee all aspects of the anti-bribery bill and any concomitant activity. A published code of conduct should include intrinsic information on the subject and of company expectations. Risk management procedures must be employed and evaluated. Accounts departments should be vigilant when processing expenses and external invoices and a robust and reliable reporting system put in place. An anti-corruption program must be implemented and monitored with equal care and attention to that given to any other corporate management or audit process. It should be modified according to the contexts of company size, value and nature of business transactions, project location and risk assessment.
In September Expolink held a Compliance Seminar which sought to address the need for education and evaluation of best business practice relating to the Act. We had the pleasure of welcoming Roderick Macaulay, a barrister co-authoring the bill, from the Ministry of Justice as speaker, amongst others, which sparked lively and necessary debate into the act and its implications and was a great success. A further seminar will coincide with the launch of the bill later this year.
If you would like further information on our solutions or receive our quarterly newsletter please call 01249 661 604 or fill out the contact form below.
Expolink is pleased to announce the introduction of a new module for its Incident and Case Management solution, Report Exec. The new ‘Crime Reports’ module, partners with Police authorities across the UK and offers the largest and most accurate resource for timely, street-level crime and sex offender information on the web. The Crime Reports network offers a myriad of affordable, easy-to-use software tools, which are created to help not only Police authorities but also many businesses understand crime trends, share up-to-date information and receive actionable intelligence. Crime Reports relies on individual Police authorities to provide details on crimes. Each authority is different and may provide more or less crime information than others. At a minimum, Crime Reports requires four items of information when mapping crimes: type, location, date, and time. All additional information is voluntarily supplied.
The Crime Reports’ built-in intelligent platform focuses on external factors and risks posed to businesses and, through linking this to Report Exec, provides daily messages and alerts to the authorised users. This information can be used to inform company directors who can in turn use this in line with company strategy to communicate health and safety to employees.
To find out more about our services or to receive our quarterly newsletter, with industry updates relevant to you, please fill in the contact form below.
Mary Portas and Michel Roux Jnr. have recently graced our screens extolling the virtues of good customer service and aiming to put paid to the perception that British customer service has more in common with the fictional antics of Basil Fawlty than the Maitre’d of Claridges. In a market saturated by consumer choice, building and maintaining a good customer service culture in your business is more important than ever. With the advent of social media and the fact that consumers now have an enormous, open forum to discuss your services it is vital that you not only offer an exceptional product but that your customers have an all-round positive experience when dealing with your company. The convenience enjoyed from shopping online adds further challenges to purely customer-facing organisations. At Expolink we believe that despite the advantages that e-commerce offers you cannot underestimate the power and value of a face-to-face conversation. Having someone actively listen and proactively meet your service requirements creates loyalty, builds brand profile and gives you a competitive edge in an increasingly over saturated market.
We live in a culture where, traditionally, the customer is always right. While this does not necessarily sit well with a profitable business strategy, there are many ways to positively manage your customer relationships without giving away your valuable profits or upsetting the apple cart. Being put unnecessarily on hold, false promises, lack of compensation, not meeting SLA’s, not recognising errors and apologising for them are all grievance trends noted in 2010 by thisismoney.co.uk. But what can be done about it?
Good customer service is achieved by choosing and nurturing a team of long-term staff who are knowledgeable, empathetic, proactive and enthusiastic about promoting your services. Management should empower their employees, building on their strengths and encouraging them to take pride in their work and the company they represent. If contentious issues arise, staff must be patient, reasonable and eager to resolve the customer’s problem. Each customer should be treated as a new opportunity to build the business whether their call is of a positive or negative nature.
At Expolink we are confident about the great service we offer our clients – acting as a seamless extension of their business, we bring expertise to every call we take and strive never to lose a customer. We coach and appraise our staff, allow them to think on their feet, use their initiative and listen closely to callers’ needs. Staff are trained for specific campaigns and allocated to particular skill groups to ensure that they have the greatest possible understanding of your business. Performance management and quality targets ensure that our colleagues have a genuine knowledge of your call handling needs. We never lose sight of the fact that your success is our success. Find out more about Expolink’s contact centre services.
Bucolic snow-covered vistas and home video footage of people skiing to the corner shops are welcome light relief at the end of news bulletins; but there is a far weightier concern for businesses across the country. The last two winters brought wide-spread and, in some areas, devastating snow storms to rural and urban communities. Snow has already been reported in as disparate locations as Gatwick and the Grampians in the earliest and farthest reaching coverage in 17 years. The Met Office’s 30-day forecast predicts snow and low temperatures right up to Christmas Eve. It is vital that companies assess their business continuity plan now to ensure that disruption to customers, suppliers and key stakeholders is kept to the absolute minimum.
In 2009 The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) estimated that 20% of the UK’s working population, or 6.4 million people, did not make it to work due to adverse weather conditions. Journeys that normally take minutes to travel stretched into hours and employers were obliged to let staff go home early or arrive late; if they made it in at all. Considering that the average commute of UK workers is 8.6 miles, the effect and potential for disruption is huge. Productivity and turnover is significantly hampered and many businesses are forced to close for the day due to the lack of trade and staff.
In January this year insurer RSA predicted that a day of severe snow could cost the UK economy as much as £690million. The Centre for Economics and Business Research estimated the daily loss would be £900m, using a calculation of UK GDP per day of about £4.5bn.
By taking action now you won’t have to find out what snow and adverse weather could cost your business.
Expolink’s many clients know that the on-going telephone and email support it provides is highly flexible and tailored towards individual businesses’ campaigns. If your staff are unable to get to work, and when all your competitors are only offering answer phone messages, your calls will be answered by a warm friendly operator ready to answer questions and take orders. In January this year, while all the aforementioned workers were stuck at home, internet, mail order and phone sales shopping saw a boost of 14.6%. These aren’t sales that your competitors alone should avail of!
Click on the link to find out how Expolink’s contact centre services can help you and your business.
To receive our quarterly newsletter, with industry updates relevant to you, please fill in the contact form below.
The SFO is the lead agency in the UK for investigating and prosecuting cases for oveseas corruption.
The interview transcription has been uploaded with kind permission of Corporate Compliance Insights. Director of the Serious Fraud Office, Richard Alderman provides his thoughts on bribery and corruption.
