
But many companies still aren’t using expense automation, and even those that do are still susceptible to determined fraudsters.

I go into Microsoft Word and change the $226 to $426, and - boom! - I just made $200.” Expense software like Abacus solves that particular risk by ensuring that receipt data matches data pulled from card transactions.

“I book a flight on Southwest to Las Vegas from Orange County on an alleged business trip, get a quote of $226, and Southwest sends me the itinerary, which is what most people submit for their expenditures. In an interview with credit card blogger The Points Guy, forensic accountant Craig Greene laid out an easy scam. It’s even easier to doctor emailed receipts, which are commonly provided with big ticket purchases like airfare and hotels. Receipt generation sites like this produce realistic fakes for free. Even if you were looking for forgeries, you probably wouldn’t catch them. Free online generators create imitation receipts that easily pass the eye test. When proof isn’t trustworthy Receipts are easier to forge than ever before. But with the emergence of blockchain technology, it is for the first time possible to envision the solution: a post-receipt world full of accurate, canonical transaction data. The system is antiquated and inherently insecure. One reason expense fraud is so rampant is that businesses still rely on receipts to document the details of transactions. It’s among the hardest types of fraud to detect-nearly impossible without expense software designed to analyze patterns-and afflicts every kind of organization, from small businesses to regulated behemoths.

The median loss per incident, according to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, is $40,000. Each year, expense fraud costs US businesses almost $3 billion. Wells Fargo has certainly battled their share of scandals recently, but they are far from the only company to deal with this issue. The investigation forced the firm to delay bonuses and terminate a number of employees. When executives noticed the alterations, they launched a review of the company’s expense filings going back months.

The staff-mostly junior analysts in the company’s San Francisco office-were discovered to be ordering food earlier than the after-hours meal policy allowed for, then doctoring the emailed receipts to submit for reimbursement. took disciplinary action against dozens of employees for violating the firm’s expense policy. A test program launched by a Chinese conglomerate could revolutionize the way businesses process expenses.Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal reported that Wells Fargo & Co.
