Procurement fraud hit one in five companies last year, research from the Economist Intelligence has revealed.
The
Global Fraud report 2011/12, commissioned by Kroll, showed 20 per cent
of companies were affected by vendor, supplier or procurement fraud, a
rise of five percentage points on last year. Meanwhile, the number of
companies describing themselves as highly or moderately vulnerable to
vendor, supplier or procurement fraud was 42 per cent. Again, this was a
considerable increase on last year when only 26 per cent said this was a
concern. The top-listed fraud this year was theft of physical assets
(25 per cent) followed by information theft (23 per cent). Below
vendor, supplier or procurement fraud came corruption and bribery (19
per cent); financial mismanagement (16 per cent); regulatory or
compliance breach (11 per cent); and at the very bottom, money
laundering (4 per cent).
Overall, the survey showed
companies faced a range of more widespread dangers, compared to last
year. “Fraudsters have been deploying a range of tools to probe
corporate defences rather than just relying on one or two,” the report
said. More than 1,200 executives were polled for the survey.
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