Employee theft is an unfortunate reality that business owners need to prepare for. You may be thinking, “my employees would never steal from me.” But internal theft is more widespread than you may think… and there are different ways your employees may be stealing from your company.
In this blog, Sonitrol Western Canada has listed the top five most common ways that staff might be misappropriating resources.
Skimming is a type of fraud where your staff member takes cash before it is entered into the books. When this happens, you may see cash register imbalances. In fact, skimming often looks like simple human error until the employee starts increasing what they take.
In more complicated skimming schemes, your employee may try to offset the missing amount by applying a coupon code to a purchase but charging the customer the full price. It could also be covered up by deleting a paid invoice or creating a false credit memo to avoid customer accounts from getting flagged as past due. This can be harder to spot.
This is a popular form of employee theft where the cashier charges your customer for the proper number of items purchased but rings less in the till. For example, your customer comes in to buy six items. The cashier charges for all six items but only inputs five items. They then pocket the cash difference.
This form of fraud is harder to spot as you won’t notice anything is wrong until you perform an inventory check or you sell out of a product that could still be in the system.
This form of theft is when an employee takes items from your business. This can include “free” food at a restaurant, products in a retail environment or even office supplies. While the items may be small, eventually the losses will add up or employees will get more confident and begin to steal large items. Any product theft will impact your profit margins.
Sweethearting is a form of theft where your employee gives their friends and family discounts or merchandise. This is often covered up by voiding scans, failing to scan items or giving a refund without taking back the item. Overriding prices is also a common form of sweethearting.
If you have an employee who is sweethearting, you may see inventory shortages or a high number of voids and overrides.
This theft isn’t related to physical property but wages. It happens when employees arrive late, leave early or take long breaks while you are compensating them. This form of fraud is harder to spot because you must catch your employee in the act.
The problem with employee theft is that it could be mistaken for human error, while at the same time human error could be mistaken as employee theft. So, to help prevent theft, minimize human error and identify the real cause, consider these tips:
Employee theft is a real issue and while you want to be able to trust your team members, you also need to protect your business. Being aware of the different forms of theft and signs that they are happening is important. But more importantly, you need to take steps to protect your business from internal and external threats.
For more information on preventing employee theft or to get a commercial security audit, contact Sonitrol Western Canada today.