Chew Valley Fraud

Originally posted by JimC Friends shouldn't put friends in a position where its easy to be tempted to do the wrong thing.

This.

'Never tempt an honest man beyond endurance', a good businessman gave me that advice many years ago he was a 505 world champion as well so it must be true.

Our club has a treasurer and is audited by one of our trustees, a chartered accountant, my ex FD.

Originally posted by about a boat Begs the question why the auditors did not get external confirmation of any assets. A standard audit procedure and one that usually starts before they come in the office to tick the numbers. https://www.ifac.org/system/files/meetings/files/2795.pdf

Originally posted by iGRF Originally posted by JimC Friends shouldn't put friends in a position where its easy to be tempted to do the wrong thing. This. 'Never tempt an honest man beyond endurance', a good businessman gave me that advice many years ago he was a 505 world champion as well so it must be true. Our club has a treasurer and is audited by one of our trustees, a chartered accountant, my ex FD.

Originally posted by Pierre ...a period of 10 years seems more like a habit than simple temptation.

That's the trouble though. Very often its a slippery slope, and it starts off with doing stuff that maybe doesn't seem all that wrong, or will be easy to resolve: 'no harm done honest mate', then it goes a little further and a little further and suddenly the bloke is halfway down a steep slope with no way back and hasn't a clue what to do and just keeps slipping...

To be quite honest 100K over 10 years, whilst not exactly chicken feed, doesn't sound like a determined criminal either. I mean, it was inevitable that such a crude fraud would be found out, and its not as if that's enough money to disappear to outer Mongolia or wherever to live in comfort. Of course if it turns out the guy was treasurer for another 20 sports clubs and all their accounts are in trouble...

But its because of the slippery slope that clubs should seek to protect their officers from the temptation of doing the wrong thing. In an ideal world all posts would be rotated regularly, but for most clubs if you've found someone who'll do a job then its theirs for life if they want...

Edited by JimC - 01 Dec 15 at 4:38pm

Some unrealistic expectations of what audited accounts means, I suspect. As Director of a small limited company I'm required to sign a letter to my auditor saying all the information I supply them is correct. They don't cross-check.