Two for you, one for me
One for you, three for me. Can you identify or prevent payroll fraud?
You would think that in today’s world of savvy technology border line with artificial intelligence; it would be impossible for fraud to be committed in a payroll office. The reality is that it is still happening. They say prevention is better than a cure. This might not be the case with payroll, however, there are measures that you could take to identify it before you are out of pocket.
What is your business actively doing to prevent or identify fraud?
Aba file manipulation
The aba file is a standard banking format of file accepted by institutions across Australia. It is a text file that can be easily read when opened, so, it can easily be changed. It is common for a payroll office to download this file from their payroll system and upload into their banking system. Today you can send a file to a bank via api (application programming interface). This means that the file is sent directly to the bank without any possible interference to the contents.
Audit and Variance reporting
Typically, in a payroll system, calculation of an employees pay is based on what is held within their employee record in the system. Being able to view or report on changes that are made between your payroll runs is invaluable to ensure that there has not been any questionable activity. Additionally, being able to see employees’ calculated pay comparatively from one to the next with a calculation of difference, can show many activities when reviewed.
Are all your eggs in the one basket?
More often than not, one person in the payroll office manages onboarding, changes, processing, bank file uploads etc. Duty segregation is essential for the payroll function. If this is not feasible because of size or security, you should be looking at outsourcing.
