Here's What You Should Do When Your Business Is Charged With Fraud

by Marius H. Keep learning

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Managing a business is never easy. You need to handle finances, deal with management, and minimize risks every step of the way. It's tough if you're an inexperienced business owner since productivity could decrease, operations could be costly, or even worse, your business could be charged with fraud.

If you find your business in this situation, the best step is to focus on preventing further losses and gather information about the case while it's still manageable. When your business is charged with fraud, it's best to take action as soon as possible to avoid bigger repercussions down the road.

Moreover, the seven steps below can help you guard your business and start its recovery process:

Look for A Legal Counsel

Your first step should involve you looking for legal counsel. You can't deal with this case yourself, so you'll need a professional to help you. Moreover, a legal counsel will guide you through the proper protocol regarding the investigation and the actual legal action to take per se. A council will also help your business seek restitution, so you should contact a professional with experience in the field.

Additionally, you could look for a counsel to represent you. For example, in the United States, you could expect lawyers to charge you an hourly rate or a flat fee option. The same options go with lawyers in Asian countries such as China since you could opt for an hourly or flat fee arrangement.

Business fraud in Australia is also prevalent, ranging from simple to complex fraud cases. From January 1 to August 31, 2022, Australian legal counsels dealt with a spike in small business fraud, resulting in a loss of more than 1.2 million Australian dollars.

With this, business owners can look to hire experienced Perth, Melbourne, Queensland, or sydney fraud lawyers to protect the welfare or interests of their business in case a fraud case is being charged. With such legal counsel, you can easily defend charges and negotiate plea deals with an early payment discount to ease your finances.

Overall, seeking an experienced and skillful legal professional helps you achieve the best results in your favor.

Consult With Key Individuals In Your Business

You should never forget your internal human resources in the decision-making process. Your board members, key management personnel, and internal audit department should be knowledgeable and informed following your policies and procedures.

In addition, you should involve those with a role in the case and inform them of every step. You could even ask key individuals how to deal with your employees, stakeholders, business partners, and the media. You could even ask for assistance on what type of information to share.

Seek A Forensic Accountant

Forensic accountants analyze financial accounts that may be used as legal evidence in court. You could seek their assistance and conduct investigations on-site or off-premises to hone the problem, quantify the loss, and preserve the evidence.

Additionally, forensic accountants can help you in interviews. If you're looking to investigate, you can count on your credentialed forensic accountant to detect verbal and nonverbal clues during an interview. There are even those that may testify in court as expert witnesses. Overall, forensic accountants are helpful when it comes to gathering and analyzing all the information you have.

Safeguard the Evidence

You'll need to safeguard your evidence since doing so will preserve its integrity. In addition, your evidence needs to be controlled and secured since this proves the extent of your innocence. Likewise, safeguarding your evidence can also impact your case's entire course.

You’ll need to gather all the necessary data, including the original and copies of all electronic backups. It would help if you collected those found on the network and local drives, and you could even include the printed copies of ledgers, invoices, bank statements, or journals.

In addition, you should keep any document that could be used as evidence later on. You could even ask the help of your legal counsel on what documents to secure if you want.

Restrict Employee Access

Since business processes are absolute haywire during this crisis, you could restrict employee access. Doing so will ensure that information won't leak out, and those that can access such information are the people directly involved in the case. Here, you could ask for guidance from your legal counsel and human resources team to help you.

Check Your Insurance

You should check your insurance to ensure it covers any financial damages from fraud committed by third parties or employees. If there is such coverage, you'll need to inform your insurance company that you've suffered quite a loss to qualify for reimbursements.

When you check your insurance, you minimize further financial damage that could be made and ensure the continuation of your business. If you're unsure how to handle and check your insurance policy, you can ask your legal counsel’s help. It's never wrong to ask for help – even more so when it's from an experienced professional.

Document Your Initiatives

Lastly, it would be best to always document your activities – from when you first discovered the charge until your most recent step.

Keeping a record helps you once you're questioned about your activities. It even provides a complete and concise reference for every matter you have. Although it isn't sure that you'll be taken in for questioning, it never hurts to be prepared.

Final Thoughts

The best way to minimize the risks is to control your internal and external resources fully. Moreover, this refers to your employees, board members, human resources, and even those you've recently hired, like your legal team and forensic accountant. Overall, these steps will help you address the matter and act with the aid of specialists in the field.