Retail Fraud Case Study

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As is the case for every sector, retail sector is subject to the risks and fraud in the procurement cycle. This makes up the second highest occurring type of economic crime (PwC, 2014., p 38). Coenen (2008 p. 86) describes procurement fraud as the manipulation of the procurement cycle with the aim of gaining an unfair advantage in the process of bidding and proposal. This process is dominant in the retail sector as the selection of vendors and assessment of the relationship is a process which is central to the functioning of a retail enterprise. The reluctance to admit to violation of fiduciary responsibilities to employers by employees makes it difficult to admit this kind of fraud and especially because it normally occurs in an external setting
It is imperative for establishments to have robust controls in processes to avoid operational frauds resulting from employee embezzlement. Albrecht et al. (2012) defines this kind of fraud as a result of employee deception by taking into their possession company assets. Cases of employee embezzlement (PwC India, 2012) include revenue leakage resulting from underpricing of products without bar code / pilferage of such products: Bar code frauds such as forged bar code labels; siphoning of discount coupons, promotional items by employees; Deliberate un-optimized inventories maintained at stores; Expense fraud resulting from fraudulent cash register disbursements; Deliberate inaccuracy in supervision and administration at retail outlets, departmental stores and supermarkets and; Tampering of IT systems for procurement, warehousing, inventory management or sales; more so considering the vast distribution network that retail companies operate in. These are normally direct ways company’s resources get into the custody of individuals without third party
(2011 p.11) describes customer fraud occurring either when customers do not pay for goods purchased or get nothing in return. Example of such fraud is what PwC India report refers to as Return Fraud. This kind of fraud is more common with retail sector and companies should pay special attention to high shrinkage rate, dramatic increase in number of returns, return policy not being enforced and increasing number of markdowns due to returns. Return fraud may take various forms such as the return of stolen merchandise; the subsequent resale of stolen merchandise in grey markets; Return of used merchandise, outside of return policy; Product exchanges, that is when a consumer comes to exchange a product which has not been purchased from the store. This is especially visible for high-value merchandise such as apparel; return of merchandise using counterfeit receipts. It is essential to look at such fraud-related schemes. Another of such retail fraud scheme is online retail and credit card fraud directly linked with identity theft. E-commerce, online retail sales have had significant increase over the years accounting for almost one third of the top 50 retail companies (Deloitte, 2014). As the name implies identity theft occurs when another person takes up the identity of another to purchase goods or engage in criminal activity or perpetrate fraud (Albrecht et al., 2011 p- 531). With the high level of usage of credit card transactions, retail companies faces the

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