Putting the AP in hAPpy

Send us Fan Mail When it comes to the vendor and buyer and who is responsible when there is a fraudulent payment can depend on the country.  Here is what happened in another court case…. Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or bad...

Send us Fan Mail There is a common scenario for those Accounts Payable or Vendor teams that can do bank account ownership validations when setting up or changing vendor data: many vendors have legitimate reasons why their bank account holder names do not match their legal name.  So, how are you supposed to know whether this is legitimate or fraudulent? Keep listening.  Check out my website www.deb...

Send us Fan Mail You may be listening to this podcast to find out what your vendors are doing, but guess what?  Your vendors are reaching out to me to understand what you are doing!  If you want to know the top 2 reasons vendors reach out to me about you (and what you can do to avoid this), then… Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentic...

Send us Fan Mail The  confirmation call has long been hailed as a safeguard against fraud. But it’s not.  Let’s delve into why and what can improve the process. Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or bad vendor data. Check out th...

Send us Fan Mail If you’re company is a small or medium sized business, don’t get comfortable about fraud – you’re being targeted too.  Troy Baker is back to talk fraud and how the fraud prevention resources at the Better Business Bureau can help you protect your payments from fraudsters. Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication te...

Send us Fan Mail Did you know you can find lots of fraud prevention resources from the Better Business Bureau?  In this episode, Troy Baker from the Michigan Better Business Bureau talks about fraud, using the BBB for validations and what we both think is the best thing to do that will keep your company protected from fraud.    Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you...

Send us Fan Mail Is your vendor master file and customer master file the same?  Don’t miss taking advantage of these key benefits when they are one in the same.  What are they?   Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or bad vendor...

Send us Fan Mail Of course – the IRS has updated the 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC again effective for reporting Tax Year 2025 payments to your vendors.  It’s not that bad though…. Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or bad vendor data....

Send us Fan Mail World Password Day is the 1st Thursday in May every year.  For the ultimate and not surprising advice this year from the National Cybersecurity Alliance….   Keep listening.   Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or bad vendor data...

Send us Fan Mail Invoice automation is great for invoice processing and even has artificial intelligence tools that can help spot attempted fraud – but it’s really the vendor setup and maintenance process that will save you from making fraudulent electronic and check payments.  Keep listening.   Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques,...

Send us Fan Mail Vendor team members need to be vigilant when collecting and confirming bank account information.  Now, some vendors are doing the same.  If you want to hear what tactics the vendors are using to secure their banking information and how it benefits vendor teams…. Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques,...

Send us Fan Mail If you perform a web search and use the results to find your vendor contact information or to confirm their information – you might want to hear what the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) warns against.  Plus what you can do instead.  Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best pra...

Send us Fan Mail Fraudsters are using snail mail to deliver scams – watch out for this one reported by the US Postal Inspection Service.   Keep listening.   Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or bad vendor data. Check out the Vendor Process Trai...

Send us Fan Mail Are you performing all required vendor validations to avoid non-compliance fines and penalties? Identify non-compliance risks, and get vendor validation recommendations for regulatory, watchlist,  and electronic payment compliance. Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best pra...

Send us Fan Mail The FBI issued a Public Service Announcement that check theft via mail is increasing.  See five ways they say criminals are stealing your vendor checks from the mail, and some resources to prevent check fraud.  Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fra...

Send us Fan Mail We are all familiar with phishing tests to test our ability to identify a fraudulent email – but what about a test to see if a fraudulent vendor request to change vendor remittance details can be leaked or changed?   Keep listening.   Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prev...

Send us Fan Mail If you still receive vendor supporting documentation via email and process vendor adds and changes manually - this topic is for you, though, it may surprise some of you since I routinely say that confirmation calls are not the silver bullet to avoid fraud.  What can 3 confirmation calls do?    Keep listening.   Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help impleme...

Send us Fan Mail I still run into vendor teams that collect vendor banking information on voided checks or letterhead.  Is that still a best practice and if not, what else should be done? Keep listening.   Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or b...

Send us Fan Mail It’s getting close to tax reporting time for your reportable non-us vendors.  In this episode, let’s talk about how to find those non-us vendors you didn’t know you had and cover the basics of the difference between 1042-S, 1042-T and the 1042. So if you are new to IRS tax reporting for non-us vendors….  Keep listening.   Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need h...

Send us Fan Mail Is your company based in the US? You may be familiar with the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), but do you know what other watchlists are required based on your company attributes or your vendor's?  If you want 5 steps to build a watchlist compliance matrix to avoid fraud and fines….. Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help imple...

Send us Fan Mail Now that most of you have distributed your 1099’s to the vendor and filed the related forms to the IRS it’s fresh in your mind that there are issues with your vendor master file. If you want a recommendation for how often you should be cleaning it and what you should include...  Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentica...

Send us Fan Mail A case of business email compromise where the vendor sued the buyer when the buyer made a fraudulent payment to a fraudster impersonating the vendor.  A classic business email compromise scam goes to court.  Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudu...

Send us Fan Mail I added two recommendations for vendor validations to add to your vendor setup and maintenance process.  See which ones they are and where to validate.    Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or bad vendor data. C...

Send us Fan Mail If you are satisfying your IRS tax reporting requirements by using the IRIS platform from the IRS, you may be interested in what I found while creating a demo of the system.    Keep listening.   Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fine...

Send us Fan Mail Welcome back.  In this episode I’ll talk about how to find if a fraudulent payment happened in December during the busy year-end. Keep listening.  Check out my website www.debrarrichardson.com if you need help implementing authentication techniques, internal controls, and best practices to prevent fraudulent payments, regulatory fines or bad vendor data. Check out my new Vendor Pr...