26 January 2026
Mention fraud in a meeting and you can almost feel the mood change. People start thinking about investigations and worst-case scenarios.
However, what regulators are actually looking for from your firm is something far less dramatic.
They want to see that firms have thought about fraud risk pragmatically and that people know what to do if something does not add up. That’s it.
No one is expected to work miracles or for you to strike down every possible fraudster.
That said, you can’t exactly ignore it and do nothing either.
Don’t fall into the trap of thinking fraud prevention is solely for compliance teams or senior leadership. Regulators expect people at all levels to understand their role in prevention.
That does not mean staff need to memorise regulations or turn into detectives. It means knowing what is normal in their role and noticing when something feels off.
A rushed request. Missing information. Emails from unknown addresses. Dodgy links. Pressure to bypass a process “just this once”. These are all red flags of a potential attack.
To get your team up to speed on the new methods scammers are using to manipulate firms, make sure they have access to the right fraud prevention training.
After all, what good is it if you’re learning about prevention tactics from years past if they don’t help you spot the sophisticated schemes you are more likely to face today?
Firms can have perfectly written policies and still run into trouble if people are uncomfortable speaking up. Regulators will pay attention to this.
They look at whether staff feel able to raise concerns and whether those concerns are taken seriously.
Some of the best ways to make sure you are providing a space for your team to come forward are to have clear, accessible reporting systems and to have your senior staff lead by example.
If managers brush things aside, then it’s hardly setting the best example, is it?
The more you treat fraud prevention as part of normal business activity, the easier it becomes to manage.
As much as we would all like to believe that, as trusted professionals, our word is good, regulators will also expect firms to provide evidence of their efforts to prevent fraud.
That includes policies, training records, risk assessments and documented processes.
We have all the courses your team needs to learn everything they need to know to protect their firm from fraud.
You’ll be able to:
To see the full extent of what you’ll get from our online compliance training platform, take a look at our e-brochure.
If you’d like to explore how your firm can improve its compliance training with us, get in touch.