Imagine this for a situation:
You receive an e-mail from your Landlord. The e-mail is expected and attached to it is an invoice along with a change in bank details. The e-mail comes from the same address as always and the headed paper and signatures on the invoice are exactly the same as previous documents. For three months the rent is transferred into the new bank account. Three and half months later you get a phone call from the Landlord asking for the £15,000 they haven’t received in rent.
In actual fact the money has gone straight into a fraudster’s pocket, disappeared never to be seen again!
Thieves no longer carry crowbars: they carry laptops and and they’re finding new ways to get in to your company to steal your hard earned cash. Some may hack into your computer system and transfer funds themselves and we are also aware of instances where fraudsters have hacked into telephone systems and dialled premium rate numbers until they are caught, whilst racking up a massive bill! The worry is that they are very inventive and increasingly more sophisticated.
There are ways in which you can try and protect yourself against this happening. You can buy sophisticated antivirus and firewall software and have thorough checking systems in place etc. All of which is good practice and should be followed, however what do you do if these systems unfortunately fail?
A Commercial Crime Insurance Policy would cover the above circumstances and reimburse the lost funds (subject to an agreed excess of course!). There are also many other extensions which can be included within the policy, including Employee dishonesty, reinstatement of data and investigation costs to name but a few.
If you have any worries please do not hesitate to contact ProAktive, who will be happy to answer any questions you may have.
By Jane Davis