Miles Mason, a Memphis divorce attorney, has a great article on his blog called Grab the Documents: What Spouses Need to Copy for Divorce Lawyers. Divorcing spouses always wonder what documents they need to take, and the list provided by Miles is a great roadmap. Read the article for details …
I love working on divorce cases where one spouse is trying to hide money. When a business owner has a cash business and is getting divorced, sometimes the income coincidentally (or not so coincidentally!) drops dramatically. What can we do to investigate that? It’s hard. The business owner knows that …
The manipulation of a company’s financial statements does not occur as often as asset misappropriation schemes like payroll fraud, check kiting, or inventory theft. And the losses from financial statement fraud aren’t readily apparent to most people. When money is stolen directly (asset misappropriation), it’s easy to see what the …
How do I come up with a fixed fee for a forensic accounting engagement? I’ve been doing fixed fees for 18 years, so I’ve developed a pretty good formula. With a fixed fee, a client is paying for a result, rather than buying my time. In most of my cases, …
Numerous signs can point to the possibility of fraud. Literally hundreds of different types of fraud schemes exist, so the number of possible red flags of fraud is huge. Today we’ll talk about one area where you may see some red flags: irregularities in the accounting records and procedures. Irregularities …
Some family law attorneys are reluctant to retain forensic accountants in their cases. Money may be a factor, but sometimes the need for an outside expert is not clear. While law firms may have paralegals or attorneys on staff who are very knowledgeable about financial issues, the outside forensic accountant …
Attorneys and accountants are told that they need to blog if they want to get clients. Blogs are a magic marketing tool. If you blog it they will come. It’s way more complicated than that. About 40% of my revenue comes from attorneys who find me using Google. It’s because …
What kinds of things can forensic accountants be involved in relative to construction fraud? A common area of fraud involves a general contractor using funds from a project to fund other projects. Also common is the construction company claiming a project is further along than it really is in order …
The culmination of a financial expert’s work in a divorce or child support case is the expert report. This is followed by testimony, at deposition and possibly trial. The process of reporting and testifying should not be taken lightly, as these tasks make the financial analysis come to life. The …
Insider fraud is most commonly detected in companies through a tip, either from an employee, a customer, a vendor, or an outside party. Anonymous hotlines are excellent tools for reporting fraud, but management must have a plan for evaluating these tips. Some tipsters are okay with revealing their identities from …