Corporate Investigations - Salgado are specialist corporate investigators

September 16th, 2008

Do you suspect that your business may already be suffering as a result of staff theft? Have you been a victim of employee theft or fraud before and want to ensure that your next new staff member is honest?

The Stark Facts

* Nearly a quarter of UK small businesses will suffer employee theft or fraud.
* 53% of unexplained losses are actually the result of staff theft.

Don’t forget that staff dishonesty may have many guises. In the modern technological age it might not be the classic “fingers in the till”. Examples of crimes committed, which we have successfully investigated include the theft of customer data and/or the sale of of the data to third parties. In the case of customer data, it is the business owner who has to demonstrate that they have stringent security measures in place, in line with the Data Protection Act.

Our corporate Investigations department investigators are specialists in preventing employee fraud or theft and if the worst has happened, successfully investigating theft or fraud and ensuring you have sufficient evidence to take appropriate action.

Our specialist corporate investigators can help by;

1 - Thoroughly verifying a new employees employment history.
2 - Supplying covert surveillance services and undercover operatives to establish evidence of theft.
3 - Supplying suitably qualified investigative interviewers to establish the facts in a case.
4 - And ensuring that you have collected evidence in a legal, ethical and effective manner in line with your companies terms and conditions of employment.

We can work closely with your HR department or offer a Human Resource specialist from within our own team to ensure that each employee, and your own business, is treated fairly and ethically.

Lets hope that you never need our services in this respect. But if you do, call us, Salgado Investigations for confidential, effective and fast action.

Posted in Human Resources, Retail Fraud Prevention, Staff Theft, Surveillance | No Comments »

Should we keep tabs on our staff?

August 25th, 2008

A culture of zero tolerance towards staff theft is sweeping its way through the country’s leading retail firms. Action to stamp out stock theft, theft from tills and growing levels of refund fraud is being taken by leading retailers.

Retailers are losing billions every year through theft, according to figures from the British Retail Consortium and about a third of this sum is attributed to dishonest staff.

As a result, retail companies are turning their attentions to internal problems, says Salgado Investigations’ senior corporate investigator Jorge Salgado-Reyes. A starting point is for companies to improve their vetting procedures during recruitment” he says. “The reality is that every major retailer has internal theft problems”.

New opportunities for staff to commit internal theft have emerged, thanks to the nature of modern retailing. For example, credit card technology gives internal scammers the ability to perform a refund transaction on their own or a friends credit card in‐store and later share the spoils. There is no physical movement of product or cash. And dishonest staff who, according to research, tend to be part‐time workers or those employed with a company for less than 12 months are ‐ searching out new ways of helping themselves. “I have investigated staff who have clocked up loyalty points on their own loyalty cards, when processing a customer’s purchases,” says Jorge Salgado-Reyes.

Retail fraud investigation specialist Jorge Salgado-Reyes says retailers must understand where such problems take place in their store.

“Technological solutions that link CCTV with EPOS or enable data mining of EPOS information to alert managers to till fraud are more common. For example, if a member of staff is carrying out an unusual number of refunds, but the CCTV shows no product being passed back, you can take action.
Similarly, clocking up fewer scans per minute than the average, managers are alerted to watch out for items being passed out for free. You might then use CCTV to investigate further.”

Jorge Salgado-Reyes urges retailers to take a holistic approach to investigations, looking beyond traditional shrinkage, because it often unearths wider operational problems that, when rectified, can save the company significant sums. “Profits may be down, but shrinkage is a constant, so losses take a larger percentage off the bottom line,” he says.

“Implanting a culture of zero tolerance needs to start with company‐wide adherence to robust company procedures,” he says. “It’s no good having woolly guidelines about when tills should be opened and how refunds are processed and recorded, because this plants the seed of opportunity in the minds of the staff. To minimise temptation, all staff need to be aware that procedures are set in stone and any straying from the rules will be investigated.”

Jorge Salgado-Reyes is also a strong advocate of properly supported systems of whistle‐blowing within the company. This involves staff being given an incentive to report suspected dishonest behaviour using a confidential helpline. Zero tolerance means dismissing and prosecuting dishonest employees wherever possible and communicating these actions back to the staff.

Posted in Retail Fraud Prevention, Staff Theft | No Comments »

To catch a thief

August 25th, 2008

Whether it is customer or staff theft, credit card fraud or products damaged in the supply chain, shrinkage is a major blight on the balance sheet of all retailers.

No doubt technology is the front line in the war on shrinkage, but there is no substitute for strict corporate policies and training staff to be vigilant in the quest to cut shrinkage.

According to Jorge Salgado-Reyes, MD of Archangel Research Limited, an investigative company specialising in corporate investigations, retailers continue to be stung by staff simply dipping their hands in the till or engaging in sweethearting. “Sweethearting is where members of the public and members of staff in retail collude. Typically, one item is scanned and several items are not,” says retail fraud investigator Jorge Salgado-Reyes.

Another major problem is fraudulent refunds of products. Jorge says: “The natural assumption about refunds is that someone is coming back into a store to ask for a cash refund. But when a member of staff fraudulently refunds an item, that staff member is telling the stock control system that one item has come back into stock when in fact nothing has come back in. He then steals the money from the till that the item is worth. The till will balance and it will not be discovered until there is a stock audit.

Ultimately, human nature dictates that retailers will never stamp out all forms of fraudulent activity. What they can do is to keep striving to integrate new technology with a culture of zero tolerance and stringent refund and stock control policies with a method of auditing the same.

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THIEVING LITTLE BRITAINS

August 13th, 2008

A leading UK Private Investigator has found that more than three quarters of workers have stolen from their current or previous places of work. The figures show that potentially over £432m of company goods, including laptops, confidential personal data, TVs, and even an office pet in one case are stolen in the UK each year. It is also clear that very few measures are in place across companies to prevent theft from happening.

Recent anonymous online research commissioned by http://www.salgadoinvestigations.com of 1,476 British people has found that 78% have stolen from their place of work at some point in their lives. This means that with individuals admitting to stealing, on average, more than £920 worth of items throughout their careers, theft at work costs the economy nearly £432m each year. The research stipulated that office stationary did not count.

Those who denied pilfering from work however are certainly no angels, as 57% of people who haven’t yet stolen from a place of work said that they would if they thought that they could get away with it.

Jorge Salgado-Reyes, a leading UK Private Investigator is an expert in the fields of corporate and company theft, infidelity and person tracing with more than 8 years in the business, and has published the findings. Jorge commissioned the research to gain more of an understanding of Britain’s habits, and to highlight how companies can help turn this problem around.

Installing or more closely monitoring CCTV could be the saving grace for those companies who are noticing that their assets are dwindling. When asked “what would deter you from stealing an item?” 38.1% of the participants admitted that video monitoring would be the main deterrent. This was followed by 19% claiming that law involvement would be the one thing to dissuade them, with just 2.4% worried that their mum could/would find out.

Jorge had the following to say,

“In my line of work, you get used to shocking stories and facts, but these stats make for pretty scary reading. Companies are doing little to stop thefts of these kinds, with very few having deterrents such as monitored CCTV or robust asset management systems in place. The theft of confidential personal data has been in the media eye recently and for good reason – more and more companies are securing the services of Private Investigators like me to detect people committing often large-scale criminal acts of these kinds.

“It just goes to show that in today’s Britain, you really don’t know who you can trust.”

Amongst the stolen items anonymously detailed in the comprehensive survey were large sums of cash, alcohol, furniture, computer equipment and even one boss’ desk.

For more information, or to arrange an interview with Jorge, please contact Rich Leigh of 10 Yetis Public Relations Agency at rich@10yetis.co.uk or 01452 527 898.

EDITORS NOTES

The anonymous independent survey of 1,476 people was carried out by 10 Yetis Public Relations Agency on behalf of Jorge Salgado-Reyes PI.

Jorge Salgado Reyes in an expert in the field of Private Investigation, and available for comment on any aspect of infidelity, person tracing and tracking, and theft.

Hi-Resolution images are available on request.

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How to prevent Staff Theft

June 29th, 2008

Is staff theft and fraud affecting your profits? Find out out how to protect yourself, your stock and your bottom line.

Retail crime is an expensive problem for company’s according to a new report by the British Chambers of Commerce which puts the annual cost of crime against business at £12.6 billion - an increase of 20 per cent since its previous survey in 2004. 3,900 businesses were surveyed nationwide and they found that 59 per cent had experienced at least one crime in the previous 12 months. This survey reflect Salgado’s own survey published as Thieving Little Britains.

Jorge Salgado-Reyes, Senior Loss Prevention investigator for Salgado Investigations, says that this holds true for most retailers, with shoplifting (external theft) being the most common cause of business loss, followed by staff theft.

The common shrink split is 70/25/5 per cent (external/internal/other) and depending on the type of retailer this is a fairly accurate split of their losses. But according to Jorge internal theft hits a business harder due to the insidious nature of the crime. It is known as “Theft Employee” and is the dark side of Loss Prevention.

Why does it hit harder? Well Jorge gives one example, imagine that you when you get home tonight, you discover that you have been the victim of a burglary. How do you feel? terrible? Then you report it to the police and they investigate it and during the course of the investigation they discover that the burglar is a friend of yours. How do you feel now? Betrayed? So what is the difference between being burglared by a stranger or a friend? The difference is that your friend has abused your friendship, your trust!

Out of a workforce, it is estimated that 25 per cent of your staff will never steal, 50 per cent may steal if given the opportunity, and the last 25 per cent will always steal. In other words potentially up to 75 per cent of your staff may steal if given the opportunity to do so.

When a member of the public steals an item, they are stealing the cost price of that item (i.e. item - retail price £29.99 - Cost price 5.99) while when a member of staff steals £30 from the till, they are stealing the retail cost i.e. the entire £30.

As you can appreciate, staff theft is a very real and significant problem.

According to Jorge Salgado-Reyes, staff theft is a more common problem than retailers care to admit. And breaking through this barrier of denial is crucial to helping businesses reduce their internal losses.

Salgado investigations offers a holistic approach to tackling staff theft including the use of a confidential staff hotline for staff to report their suspicions about other dishonest staff. Reviewing a company’s security and loss prevention procedures, the use of covert CCTV, test purchasing, GPS tracking of distribution fleets, and undercover operatives being entered into the work force.

Ultimately, the question should not be whether you can afford to implement security measures but whether you can afford not to.

Jorge adds: “Don’t turn a blind eye to staff theft, if you accept it, you will be nurturing a culture of staff dishonesty where your dishonest staff teach new staff to steal and you will start to lose money at an exponential rate.”

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