Organised by the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE), International Fraud Awareness Week is a global effort dedicated to fraud awareness, detection and prevention.  Click here for the official website.

WHY IS FRAUD AWARENESS SO IMPORTANT?

Organisations worldwide lose an estimated 5% of their annual revenue to fraud, according to the 2016 ACFE Report to the Nations on Occupational Fraud and Abuse. This translates to a global average of nearly A$3.7 trillion dollars annually.

Fraud takes many shapes and forms, among them corporate fraud, consumer fraud, tax fraud, identity theft and many others.  According to ACFE research, the most common form of occupational fraud was Asset Misappropriation, with billing schemes, expense reimbursement and cheque tampering schemes occurring most frequently.  Whilst Financial Statement fraud (improper disclosures, improper asset valuation and understated revenues) occurs less often but it causes the greatest median loss.

WHAT CAN YOUR ORGANISATION DO FOR INTERNATIONAL FRAUD AWARENESS WEEK?

Fraud Week is the perfect time to go a step further to raise fraud awareness in your organisation.

There are many things organisations can do during International Fraud Awareness Week, but here is our top 6 things:

1. REVIEW YOUR FRAUD AND CORRUPTION PREVENTION POLICY AND PLAN

A key element of any Fraud Management Framework is an overarching Fraud and Corruption Prevention Policy and a concise and relevant Fraud and Corruption Prevention Plan.  When was the last time your policy and plan reviewed and updated?  We suggest the plan be reviewed at least annually and during International Fraud Awareness Week is the perfect time.

Want to achieve best practice? Schedule an independent review of your Fraud Management Framework every 3-5 years.

2. UPDATE YOUR ORGANISATIONS FRAUD RISK PROFILE

Which areas in your organisation are most exposed to fraud?

We suggest reviewing your risk register/ risk profiles and your incident register during International Fraud Awareness Week and scheduling some fraud risk assessment workshops for locations and business processes where risks are high.

3. CONDUCT A CRISIS MANAGEMENT EXERCISE INVOLVING A MAJOR FRAUD EVENT

If a major fraud is discovered in your organisation, it is likely that the crisis management team will be invoked. How well are you prepared? How will you handle the crisis? What will you say to the media?  For something a little different, why not plan a surprise crisis management desk top exercise during International Fraud Awareness Week.

4. SCHEDULE FRAUD AWARENESS TRAINING

InConsult offers a public training course, Fraud and Corruption Awareness. The course is designed to help managers and staff understand the types of fraud and corruption risks, identify the early warning signs of potential fraud and develop strategies for designing effective internal controls. To book your place, click here.  

Prefer in-house training? Please contact us to discuss your specific training needs.

5. STAY INFORMED – READ AND CIRCULATE RELEVANT PUBLICATIONS TO STAFF

Awareness is about engaging with staff in different ways.  Most professionals appreciate an informative, easy to ready publication to improve their knowledge and raise their technical competency to another level.  Check out these publications.

• Looking Out for the Fraud Red Flags Source: InConsult
• Scepticism Key To Winning The Fight Against Fraud Source: CPA Australia
• ACFE Report to the Nations on Occupational Fraud and Abuse Source: Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE)

Frauds occur every day and one way we can learn to improve fraud controls is through the errors and experiences of others.  Stay up to date with the latest news and developments in fraud prevention, risk management, governance and internal audit, by following InConsult on Twitter.

6. WATCH ONE MINUTE RISK MANAGER

No time to read articles or attend a training course!  Grab a drink, pop-corn, sit back, relax and tune in to our One Minute Risk Manager YouTube channel to watch a number of episodes about Fraud including “5 Tips to Protect Your Organisation from Internal Fraud” and “Understanding Fraud Red Flags”, click here to watch. 

7. VISIT FRAUDWEEK.COM

Visit fraudweek.com for more ways to get involved.

FIND OUT MORE

For more information about how you can prevent fraud in your organisation, visit our Fraud and Corruption Prevention services page. If you would like to discuss our fraud and corruption prevention services, please contact us.