#fraud-prevention
Proactive strategies and controls to prevent financial fraud in your business
A 2026 TIGTA audit found 1,375 unauthorized entries into restricted taxpayer-document areas and critical vulnerabilities left unpatched an average of 223 days at IRS scanning contractors. Here is what the watchdog found, how the IRS responded, and the concrete steps — IP PIN enrollment, early filing, e-filing — that reduce your exposure.
Shadow AI usage has grown 156% since 2023, and unsanctioned AI tools sit on company cards an average of 400+ days before detection. A practical guide for small businesses on finding unapproved ChatGPT, Jasper, and Perplexity charges, plus a five-step quarterly AI spend audit.
Freight brokers earn the spread between shipper billings and carrier cost — not gross freight value. How to book factoring (a receivable sale at 1–5% recourse, 2.5–5% non-recourse), separate quick pay discounts, track the $75,000 BMC-84/BMC-85 requirement, and use AP discipline to catch double-brokering fraud, now a $500–$700 million annual industry loss.
On April 1, 2026, Visa's VAMP program cut the merchant fraud-and-dispute threshold from 2.2% to 1.5% in the US, Canada, EU, and Asia-Pacific. Here's how the (TC40 + TC15) ÷ settled transactions ratio works, the 1,500-event monthly floor, the $8-per-transaction penalty, and six concrete steps to stay under the line.
The FTC's Consumer Review Rule (16 C.F.R. Part 465) took effect October 21, 2024, and in December 2025 the agency sent its first warning letters — with civil penalties of up to $53,088 per violation and no small-business exemption. A practical guide to the six prohibited practices, from rating-conditioned rewards to review gating, and a five-step compliance checklist owners can finish in a week.
A single 50-gallon barrel of used cooking oil is worth $100-185 to a biodiesel refiner, so collectors must book collected-but-unsold oil as inventory-in-transit, track actual weighed pounds per stop rather than estimates, and reconcile collected-to-shipped volume weekly to catch theft and double-invoicing before it erodes route profitability.
FedNow and RTP now reach roughly 75% of U.S. bank accounts, settling payments in seconds, 24/7/365, with a $10 million network transaction limit. This guide explains how ISO 20022 structured remittance data changes invoice matching and reconciliation, why irrevocable instant payments demand wire-transfer-level fraud controls, and what small businesses should ask their bank and accounting software in 2026.
KPMG Australia is preparing to cut over 1,000 of roughly 10,000 jobs and reduce partner pay by up to 20% after admitting it mishandled a 2024 whistleblower complaint alleging misuse of confidential client data. The same five independence threats behind the scandal — self-interest, self-review, advocacy, familiarity, and intimidation — apply to any local CPA firm, and this guide covers the red flags plus a five-step due-diligence checklist (license lookup, peer review report, references, commission disclosure, engagement-letter scope) for vetting your own accountant.
Chase rolled out passkey login and a Trusted Contact Person feature in early 2026 to counter AI voice-cloning fraud, which costs small businesses $30,000 to $400,000 per incident on average.
Private school tuition is an exchange transaction under ASC 606, not a donation, so tuition collected before the school year starts must be booked as deferred revenue and recognized ratably over 10 or 12 months, while donor-restricted gifts follow separate ASC 958 rules.
The FBI's IC3 logged $3.05 billion in business email compromise losses in 2025, and only 25% of small businesses have a whistleblower reporting mechanism versus 85% of large companies — here's how vendor impersonation, payroll diversion, and check fraud unfold, and the controls that stop them before a wire goes out.
A side-by-side comparison of Bill.com, Melio, and Ramp for accounts-payable automation — pricing, ERP integrations, AI invoice coding, and which tool fits businesses by invoice volume and approval complexity.
