Life after fraud

How would you deal with this situation?

Late last year, one of our clients was almost taken in by a fraudster who had called, pretending to be from his bank.

The crook was very convincing.

He asked our client to verify his identity, and then asked about a payment which seemed legitimate.

By the time the client became suspicious, phoning us for help while the scammer was still on the other line, he had already provided his full customer ID number.

The bank confirmed that within an hour of the call, there were immediate attempts to access his account using that number.

Well, those are all the gory details…. But here is the dilemma.

After we contacted the bank, they immediately froze his account and changed all his details.

It just so happened that payroll was due the next day. And there were supplier payments that were due to go out, as well.

The potential ramifications for his account…

For his staff…

For his suppliers…

And for his business reputation…

Were enormous.

Would you, or your team, know what to do in this situation?

Where would you start? What would do you need to check? What emergency measures do you need to put in place?

How would you minimise the disruption?

Because this is an unusual situation, most in-house accounting teams will have no experience dealing with it.

You and your team would have to figure it out as you go along.

And that means that confusion and turmoil can reign, and potentially continue for days.

That’s not what happened to our client, because we manage their finances.

We have processes to help us deal with situations like these – so we knew exactly how to resolve the issues quickly.

We were aware of the payments that were due to come out of the account, because we had set them up.

There was no scrambling around to figure out what payments might be affected – it was all documented.

Because we check their cash flow every single day, we knew that those payments had already been committed, and would be made regardless.

This was enormously reassuring to the client, because he knew straight away that his staff and suppliers would not be affected.

And we know one of the senior staff members at the bank very well, and immediately got in touch. They helped smooth out the process considerably, which again was a big relief to the client.

Of course, if you’re running your own business, you won’t need a process to help resolve bank fraud every day (hopefully!).

It is an unusual occurrence, although it is happening more and more, and the fraudsters are becoming VERY clever.

But we have hundreds of processes to help companies just like yours run their finances much more smoothly – whether that is processing payments, ensuring a smooth cash flow or getting the financial data you need to make good decisions.

And they are all put to work, on behalf of our clients.

The result is that you get much greater control over your company’s financial situation…

And there is a sense of calm around your finances, because everything is in hand…

Day-to-day, and even in emergencies.

If you would like help putting in place that kind of financial management for your company, get in touch with me today.

These processes are not a luxury – you need to professionalise the way your finances are run, if you want to scale from £1 or £2 million to £5 million, £10 million or beyond.

So don’t wait.

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