It is not unusual for companies to neglect applying their normal pre-employment screening practices when it comes to their directors, board members and non-executive directors. Research released by the UK's Insolvency Service showed that there is a significant increase in criminal malpractice amongst company directors.
The directors of 91 companies were banned for financial crime over the year as more directors turned to fraud to try to salvage something for themselves from ailing companies. In this tough economic times, companies should also make an extra effort to conduct proper due dilligence on their suppliers, especially those suppliers who have access to sensitive company information, or client data.
Guy Logan reports for Personnel Today:
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HR must be on watch for directors’ fraud
Guy Logan05 May 2009 14:11
HR must be extra-vigilant against a rise in fraud by company directors during the recession, a lawyer has warned.
Statistics published by the government's UK Insolvency Service at the weekend revealed that the number of directors banned for criminal malpractice jumped by almost one third (31%), to 1,852 directors who were charged in the 12 months to March.
Disqualification proceedings launched against directors for crimes such as fraud or theft rose by 72%, while cases of misappropriation of assets grew by almost 20%.
Edward Starling, solicitor at law firm Wedlake Bell, warned that company directors were just as likely to commit fraud as junior employees.
"It's well known that fraud increases in the recession, but it's possible that some counter-fraud departments miss serious fraud because they are too focused on the smaller fish [more junior employees]," he told Personnel Today.
"The increase in disqualification cases being launched over the past year is huge, and this number will only rise in the coming months."
Starling added that limited resources for the Insolvency Service, which unearthed the majority of cases of malpractice by directors, would mean many bosses would elude justice.
Research last year found one in five employees admitted to committing fraud by exaggerating expense claims.
Showing posts with label staff fraud. Show all posts
Showing posts with label staff fraud. Show all posts
Wednesday, 6 May 2009
Tuesday, 28 April 2009
E-Verify in Hot Water about Error Rate
An SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management http://shrmjax.org/pdfs/08-0447%202nd%20Quarter%202008.pdf) backed bill launched an employment verification debate on the other side of the pond. Apparently monster-sized databases are debated around the world, not just in the UK.
__________________________________________________________________________
Mark Schoeff Jr reports for Workforce Week
With momentum building for Congress to address comprehensive immigration reform later this year, two members of the House have introduced a bill to put employment verification at the center of the debate.
Written by Reps. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Arizona, and Sam Johnson, R-Texas, the measure would establish a mandatory electronic verification system that replaces an existing government-run system that has been roundly criticized by employer groups.
Giffords and Johnson hope their bill, the New Employee Verification Act, will either be the foundation for work-site enforcement in a broader immigration bill or move through Congress on its own.
The bill was introduced Wednesday, April 22, and announced by Giffords and Johnson on Thursday, April 23. It was originally offered in the previous Congress but had to be reintroduced because it did not become law.
The legislation mandates that all employers sign up for the Electronic Employment Verification System, which is based on the new-hire system used in each state to enforce child support payments. About 90 percent of employers use the new-hire system already.
Information for recently hired employees would be checked against Social Security and Department of Homeland Security databases to determine work eligibility. The system would eliminate the I-9 immigration form.
Alternatively, employers could register for the Secure Electronic Employment Verification System, a network of government-certified private sector companies that would authenticate a workers’ identity through a biometric identifier like a thumbprint.
The bill would establish civil and criminal penalties for employers that knowingly hire illegal immigrants.
Giffords and Johnson have been working with the HR Initiative for a Legal Workforce on the legislation. The organization is led by the Society for Human Resource Management and also includes the HR Policy Association and the National Association of Manufacturers.
The HR groups have led a charge against E-Verify, the government-run electronic verification system that is currently used on a voluntary basis by 118,917 employers.
“E-Verify’s significant error rate and reliance on paper-based identity documents often deny legal workers employment and can lead to fraud and identity theft,” the HR Initiative wrote in an April 23 letter to members of Congress. “Employers, in turn, are left vulnerable to sanctions through no fault of their own.”
E-Verify detractors say that the 4.1 percent error rate in the Social Security database could lead to millions of people being incorrectly ruled ineligible for work.
E-Verify proponents, which include many Republicans and conservative Democrats, say that the system confirms 96 percent of queries instantly and has an error rate of less than 1 percent.
Like E-Verify, the Electronic Employee Verification System would rely on the Social Security database. But the Giffords-Johnson bill requires that the Social Security information be cleaned up before the new system is launched.
In a conference call with reporters Thursday, Giffords called the proposal a “simple, effective, balanced alternative to E-Verify. It is a realistic piece of legislation.”
She also touted a provision that would establish federal pre-emption of state laws on employment verification. Her home state of Arizona was the first of several to mandate that employers use E-Verify—an experiment that is not succeeding, according to Giffords.
“Immigration is in the federal purview,” she said. “We should be dealing with it at the congressional level, not piecemeal state by state.”
It’s not yet clear when Congress will take up immigration reform. A comprehensive bill sparked political combustion in 2007 and died in the Senate. In the last couple weeks, the Obama administration has indicated it wants to address comprehensive immigration this year.
So far, individual dimensions of reform—such as verification and employment visas—have not been able to move on their own. But E-Verify is scheduled to expire on September 30, which might give work-site enforcement separate momentum.
Johnson says the electronic verification bill doesn’t have to be held up until comprehensive reform is complete.
“This year, we stand a great chance of passing it out of the House and Senate,” Johnson said. “It doesn’t have to wait. It can be combined later.”
As the immigration debate gets under way, HR organizations are trying to influence the outcome, especially on verification.
“SHRM feels strongly that employers should be part of the solution to illegal immigration,” said Mike Aitken, SHRM director of government affairs.
__________________________________________________________________________
Mark Schoeff Jr reports for Workforce Week
With momentum building for Congress to address comprehensive immigration reform later this year, two members of the House have introduced a bill to put employment verification at the center of the debate.
Written by Reps. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Arizona, and Sam Johnson, R-Texas, the measure would establish a mandatory electronic verification system that replaces an existing government-run system that has been roundly criticized by employer groups.
Giffords and Johnson hope their bill, the New Employee Verification Act, will either be the foundation for work-site enforcement in a broader immigration bill or move through Congress on its own.
The bill was introduced Wednesday, April 22, and announced by Giffords and Johnson on Thursday, April 23. It was originally offered in the previous Congress but had to be reintroduced because it did not become law.
The legislation mandates that all employers sign up for the Electronic Employment Verification System, which is based on the new-hire system used in each state to enforce child support payments. About 90 percent of employers use the new-hire system already.
Information for recently hired employees would be checked against Social Security and Department of Homeland Security databases to determine work eligibility. The system would eliminate the I-9 immigration form.
Alternatively, employers could register for the Secure Electronic Employment Verification System, a network of government-certified private sector companies that would authenticate a workers’ identity through a biometric identifier like a thumbprint.
The bill would establish civil and criminal penalties for employers that knowingly hire illegal immigrants.
Giffords and Johnson have been working with the HR Initiative for a Legal Workforce on the legislation. The organization is led by the Society for Human Resource Management and also includes the HR Policy Association and the National Association of Manufacturers.
The HR groups have led a charge against E-Verify, the government-run electronic verification system that is currently used on a voluntary basis by 118,917 employers.
“E-Verify’s significant error rate and reliance on paper-based identity documents often deny legal workers employment and can lead to fraud and identity theft,” the HR Initiative wrote in an April 23 letter to members of Congress. “Employers, in turn, are left vulnerable to sanctions through no fault of their own.”
E-Verify detractors say that the 4.1 percent error rate in the Social Security database could lead to millions of people being incorrectly ruled ineligible for work.
E-Verify proponents, which include many Republicans and conservative Democrats, say that the system confirms 96 percent of queries instantly and has an error rate of less than 1 percent.
Like E-Verify, the Electronic Employee Verification System would rely on the Social Security database. But the Giffords-Johnson bill requires that the Social Security information be cleaned up before the new system is launched.
In a conference call with reporters Thursday, Giffords called the proposal a “simple, effective, balanced alternative to E-Verify. It is a realistic piece of legislation.”
She also touted a provision that would establish federal pre-emption of state laws on employment verification. Her home state of Arizona was the first of several to mandate that employers use E-Verify—an experiment that is not succeeding, according to Giffords.
“Immigration is in the federal purview,” she said. “We should be dealing with it at the congressional level, not piecemeal state by state.”
It’s not yet clear when Congress will take up immigration reform. A comprehensive bill sparked political combustion in 2007 and died in the Senate. In the last couple weeks, the Obama administration has indicated it wants to address comprehensive immigration this year.
So far, individual dimensions of reform—such as verification and employment visas—have not been able to move on their own. But E-Verify is scheduled to expire on September 30, which might give work-site enforcement separate momentum.
Johnson says the electronic verification bill doesn’t have to be held up until comprehensive reform is complete.
“This year, we stand a great chance of passing it out of the House and Senate,” Johnson said. “It doesn’t have to wait. It can be combined later.”
As the immigration debate gets under way, HR organizations are trying to influence the outcome, especially on verification.
“SHRM feels strongly that employers should be part of the solution to illegal immigration,” said Mike Aitken, SHRM director of government affairs.
Monday, 23 March 2009
CIFAS Staff Fraud Database
CIFAS FRAUDSCAPE
The CIFAS Staff Fraud Database is a data-sharing scheme that enables responsible employers to file proven cases of staff fraud in order to prevent the perpetrator moving unchallenged to a new employer to commit further fraud.
An employer accesses the database in order to:
file data about identified staff fraud cases
check staff fraud records filed by other CIFAS Members.
This can be done either to pre-screen applicants or to screen current employees. Almost 120 employers already share information in this way. As a member of the Staff Fraud Database, Powerchex can access the database on behalf of CIFAS members.Click on the link below for an analysis of the cases of staff fraud filed to the CIFAS Staff Fraud Database by those organisations.
http://www.cifas.org.uk/download/fraudscape.pdf
The CIFAS Staff Fraud Database is a data-sharing scheme that enables responsible employers to file proven cases of staff fraud in order to prevent the perpetrator moving unchallenged to a new employer to commit further fraud.
An employer accesses the database in order to:
file data about identified staff fraud cases
check staff fraud records filed by other CIFAS Members.
This can be done either to pre-screen applicants or to screen current employees. Almost 120 employers already share information in this way. As a member of the Staff Fraud Database, Powerchex can access the database on behalf of CIFAS members.Click on the link below for an analysis of the cases of staff fraud filed to the CIFAS Staff Fraud Database by those organisations.
http://www.cifas.org.uk/download/fraudscape.pdf
Wednesday, 18 March 2009
Should hiring decisions be made by looking at social networking sites?
Views vary widely on the subject of trawling through social networking sites as part of the pre-employment screening process. Here at Powerchex our view has always been that there are too many legal and ethical pitfalls to this process and for that reason we do not incorporate these searches to our screening process. As an employer you need to make up your mind of course. Here are two views on the subject that may help you decide:
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Louisa Peacock reports for Personnel today:
A quarter of employers worldwide are checking social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace for information about job candidates, research has revealed.
The study by talent management consultancy DDI found that 25% of 1,910 job interviewers across the globe, and 12% of employers in the UK, were checking out candidate profiles or photos before deciding whether to interview them.
More than half (52%) of those that did look up prospective employee profiles on such sites admitted they used the information to make hiring decisions.
The news comes just days after Personnel Today reported that employers should encourage their staff to use Facebook and Twitter to help network with their peers.
However, less than a third of 3,523 jobseekers (32%) surveyed by DDI worldwide, and just a quarter (25%) of applicants in the UK, believed that what they put on social networking sites might affect their chances of getting a job.
Steve Newhall, vice-president for Europe at DDI, said: "Interviewers should realise that much of what is put [on Facebook] is for fun, and is unlikely to reflect a candidate's on-the-job demeanour or performance. It's difficult to gauge when looking at Facebook-type data if the information is true or has any relevance for the job role in question. A well-planned and conducted selection process will uncover relevant information about candidates' ability to do the job."
The 2009 Global Interviewing Practices and Perceptions survey found that German employers were almost twice as likely as any other country to conduct online searches, with 46% reporting they use this technique to make hiring decisions.
The practice of checking social networking sites becomes more prevalent the younger the interviewer. Globally, only 19% of those over 50 checked these sites, compared to 46% of those under 25.
The global survey interviewed 248 employers and 704 jobseekers in the UK.
_____________________
Jo Wort, professional support lawyer, and Gagandeep Prasad, solicitor Charles Russell present the legal view on the subject:
There are several issues raised by this approach to recruitment. The first is one of potential discrimination arising out of the age profile of internet users. In adopting a policy of online application only, it is likely that many older candidates will be excluded before the recruitment process has even begun. If faced with an age discrimination claim, the company would have to seek to justify this approach.
Trawling through these sites on receipt of an application is pre-employment vetting. Potentially, this raises both discrimination and data protection issues. For example, there may be information obtained from these sites that relate to an individual's sexual orientation, or religious belief that impact, or are perceived to impact, on the eventual decision whether or not to recruit. Information that impacts on recruitment decisions in this way will be grounds for a discrimination claim.
A further issue with trawling these sites is the question of verification. What weight do you place on the information found? Was it placed by the individual themselves, or a disgruntled former friend or colleague? The Employment Practices Data Protection Code makes clear that an employer should "not place reliance on information collected from possibly unreliable sources. Allow the applicant to make representations regarding information that will affect the decision to finally appoint". The applicant should therefore be given the opportunity to deal with information that the company has found on a social networking site that negatively impacts on any decision whether or not to recruit.
Such searches are effectively pre-employment vetting and the Employment Practices Data Protection Code states that employers should "only use vetting thing as a means of obtaining specific information, not as a means of general intelligence gathering". This should only be undertaken where there are significant risks to clients/customer, and ideally only late in the recruitment stage, so that not all applicants are vetted routinely.
Searching social networking sites as a recruitment tool raises many potential issues and, as a matter of best practice, should not be generally adopted.
______________________________________________________
Louisa Peacock reports for Personnel today:
A quarter of employers worldwide are checking social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace for information about job candidates, research has revealed.
The study by talent management consultancy DDI found that 25% of 1,910 job interviewers across the globe, and 12% of employers in the UK, were checking out candidate profiles or photos before deciding whether to interview them.
More than half (52%) of those that did look up prospective employee profiles on such sites admitted they used the information to make hiring decisions.
The news comes just days after Personnel Today reported that employers should encourage their staff to use Facebook and Twitter to help network with their peers.
However, less than a third of 3,523 jobseekers (32%) surveyed by DDI worldwide, and just a quarter (25%) of applicants in the UK, believed that what they put on social networking sites might affect their chances of getting a job.
Steve Newhall, vice-president for Europe at DDI, said: "Interviewers should realise that much of what is put [on Facebook] is for fun, and is unlikely to reflect a candidate's on-the-job demeanour or performance. It's difficult to gauge when looking at Facebook-type data if the information is true or has any relevance for the job role in question. A well-planned and conducted selection process will uncover relevant information about candidates' ability to do the job."
The 2009 Global Interviewing Practices and Perceptions survey found that German employers were almost twice as likely as any other country to conduct online searches, with 46% reporting they use this technique to make hiring decisions.
The practice of checking social networking sites becomes more prevalent the younger the interviewer. Globally, only 19% of those over 50 checked these sites, compared to 46% of those under 25.
The global survey interviewed 248 employers and 704 jobseekers in the UK.
_____________________
Jo Wort, professional support lawyer, and Gagandeep Prasad, solicitor Charles Russell present the legal view on the subject:
There are several issues raised by this approach to recruitment. The first is one of potential discrimination arising out of the age profile of internet users. In adopting a policy of online application only, it is likely that many older candidates will be excluded before the recruitment process has even begun. If faced with an age discrimination claim, the company would have to seek to justify this approach.
Trawling through these sites on receipt of an application is pre-employment vetting. Potentially, this raises both discrimination and data protection issues. For example, there may be information obtained from these sites that relate to an individual's sexual orientation, or religious belief that impact, or are perceived to impact, on the eventual decision whether or not to recruit. Information that impacts on recruitment decisions in this way will be grounds for a discrimination claim.
A further issue with trawling these sites is the question of verification. What weight do you place on the information found? Was it placed by the individual themselves, or a disgruntled former friend or colleague? The Employment Practices Data Protection Code makes clear that an employer should "not place reliance on information collected from possibly unreliable sources. Allow the applicant to make representations regarding information that will affect the decision to finally appoint". The applicant should therefore be given the opportunity to deal with information that the company has found on a social networking site that negatively impacts on any decision whether or not to recruit.
Such searches are effectively pre-employment vetting and the Employment Practices Data Protection Code states that employers should "only use vetting thing as a means of obtaining specific information, not as a means of general intelligence gathering". This should only be undertaken where there are significant risks to clients/customer, and ideally only late in the recruitment stage, so that not all applicants are vetted routinely.
Searching social networking sites as a recruitment tool raises many potential issues and, as a matter of best practice, should not be generally adopted.
Thursday, 12 March 2009
Verifying Chinese Degrees and Qualifications
Anyone that has tried to verify a Chinese Degree will tell you that it is a time consuming and sometimes unreliable process. The easier way to do it is through the China Academic Degrees and Graduate Education Development Center.
Their website is: http://www.cdgdc.edu.cn/xwweben/xw_aboutus.jsp and any company or individual can apply on line for a verification. These verifications need to be applied for in Chinese at: http://www.cdgdc.edu.cn/rzgl/apply/login.jsp and the cost varies between £25 and £35. Payment needs to be made by bank transfer and the verification process takes 20 days or less. If you find this too complicated and time consuming, we can do it on your behalf for a small admin fee.
The Introduction of CDGDC China Academic Degrees & Graduate Education Development Center (CDGDC) is an administrative department directly under the Ministry of Education, operating under the joint leadership of The Ministry of Education and The Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council (ADCSC). CDGDC is a non-profit agency with the independent qualification of legal entity.
Their website is: http://www.cdgdc.edu.cn/xwweben/xw_aboutus.jsp and any company or individual can apply on line for a verification. These verifications need to be applied for in Chinese at: http://www.cdgdc.edu.cn/rzgl/apply/login.jsp and the cost varies between £25 and £35. Payment needs to be made by bank transfer and the verification process takes 20 days or less. If you find this too complicated and time consuming, we can do it on your behalf for a small admin fee.
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