Internal staff fraud in the dairy sector

A Hamilton woman has been found guilty of stealing $720,000 from her former employer.

This happened over a 20-month period and Involved 1530 metric tonnes of dairy products sold at below-market prices. Some of the fraudulent activity was achieved by altering of invoices. The supplier she was collaborating with was also making PAYE payments back to the Hamilton woman. The stolen money was then used to fund everyday purchases.

View article here: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/hamilton-mums-home-improvements-holidays-funded-by-720k-stolen-from-fonterra/RPUZ6MSLSJGK5JP4XK4WDK7TXQ/

What is highlighted here is that this happened during 2018-2019 but it has taken 4 years to conduct the investigation and progress it through the New Zealand court system.
These costs are in addition to what has been stolen and doesn’t include intangible losses relating to the company's brand which are usually quite substantial also.

This is a good example of how important ‘segregation of duties’ are in the financial approval process. Which of course is one of the many features that make VigilantPay an essential weapon for fraud and error prevention in any medium to large organisation.

Call us today if you would like to find out more about how we can help you ‘beef up’ your payment policies and processes.