Do You Know Who You are Selling to?
Running a business comes with many stresses and worries. No matter whether you are selling online or in person, you need to make sure that you are always selling to a real person. Fraud can be a severe issue for commercial activities. Let’s take a closer look at the importance of knowing just who your customers are.
Avoiding Fraud
The biggest reason to monitor your sales is to prevent fraudulent customers. People commit fraud for any number of reasons, and their patterns might not always make sense. More often than not, they will target items you would not expect. It might be buying multiples of a low-value item, or it could be buying and returning an expensive piece of stock. You cannot predict what they will buy.
Nevertheless, you can put in place some essential practices to ensure that you are not selling to fraudulent customers or people who might not be allowed to purchase your items.
Staying Compliant
One of the easiest ways to ensure that you are always selling to a legitimate customer is to use an identity verification process like those offered by Cognito. These are discrete and might not even be noticed by customers; ideal if you are trying to prevent fraudulent activity.
These algorithms are intelligent, and they can keep up to date with any changes which might occur. So, for example, if a customer who is registered as banned tries to buy from your site under an assumed identity, the software will recognize him/her. This person will then be prevented from completing the purchase, and their new credentials will be updated to the watchlist. Software like this is vital for keeping your company on top of the latest trends and changes in security and compliance.
Train Your Staff to detect fraud
More often than not, software such as this is not enough. You need to make sure that your staff knows how to recognize fraudulent activity when they see it. This is incredibly important if you have a physical storefront. Training your staff to spot suspicious behavior is extremely valuable. It would help if you also put in place simple procedures for checking banknotes and cards to ensure things can’t go wrong.
Your staff was selected for a reason, and they should care about protecting the business as much as you do. If you provide the training, they will identify fraudulent behavior, and the team should get much better at spotting anyone who might be an issue.
With some good fortune, your business might never attract serious fraudsters. However, you cannot live by the belief that you will never be a target of fraud. By putting the right protocols in place and training your staff to a high standard, you could successfully avoid any significant incidents. A proactive approach is always going to work the best. After all, there is absolutely no way you can know exactly who you are selling your products to.
