Don’t Let a Dishonest Employee Take Your Money

A company I worked for had an employee embezzle about $500,000.  She did all the accounts receivable, accounts payable, payroll, reconciled the bank statements AND she did it all with no checks and balances in place.

Don’ let this happen to you:  Employee Embezzlement

ENOUGH SAID – You get the picture

SOLUTION:

Ensure there is a separation of duties:   Everyone knows that one person shouldn’t be handling all the bookkeeping work. The person handling accounts receivable should be different than the one paying bills. Often though, smaller practices don’t have the flexibility to have more than one person to do everything.  Even so, there are checks and balances you can put in place to ensure that your money stays your money. Here are three things you can do to nip employee embezzlement in the bud.

1. You should have access to your accounting system . With cloud applications such as QuickBooks Online or Xero, you can access it at any time to review the work being done. If something looks suspicious, there are audit trails to see who changed transactions.
2. Use technology to your advantage . Applications such as bill.com have procedures in place that so that nothing gets paid without your approval
3. YOU review bank statements every month . Look at the check images and online purchases. Do they make sense to you? Is there anything that doesn’t appear correct? Investigate it, Compare charges on the statement against the accounting application.  ASK QUESTIONS. EXPECT ANSWERS.

Obviously, this is not an exhaustive list. But it will help you to protect your money from many common embezzlement tactics. As the owner of ProAct Bookkeeping, I can help you put these systems in place. Contact me today to discuss your needs.