SMEs blasé about fraud

SME’s ostrich-like attitude to rising fraud levels is laying them wide open to attack.

Just a third of the UK companies in the £5m to £500m bracket surveyed by analyst KPMG have a dedicated fraud policy. Two-thirds of the 100 respondents ignored evidence of the escalating fraud problem, believing it isn’t a growing issue.

Although 76% paid lip service to the importance of managing risk, few could give details of how they were proactively tackling fraud.

Hitesh Patel, director of Fraud Investigations at KPMG Forensic, charges mid-sized companies to follow the lead of larger organisations and tackle the problem upfront.

“It is more effective to spend time developing systems to prevent fraud than dealing with the damaging fall-out from a successful fraud, which in extreme cases can lead to the collapse of a business,” he said.

Less stringent regulations and poor or mistaken leadership have contributed to the apathy in the market, he believed.