Check Fraud and Check Washing

Check Fraud and Check Washing

Week 6 Paper

Park University

Check Fraud and Check Washing

Check fraud and check washing are both highly illegal and both are increasing at an alarming rate. Many people can be fooled in today’s world with fraudulent checks and not know that anything was incorrect until receiving notice from their financial institution. Check washing is when mail snatchers will take a check from you and use chemicals to erase the things written on the check and make the check payable to themselves increasing the value of the check by hundreds and sometimes even thousands.

“The National Consumers League is alerting the public to the growing problem of fake check scams. (USA.gov)” Many financial institutions have come into contact with many problems of fake checks. There are many ways of creating a fraudulent check. According to the 2013 Payments Fraud and Control survey, eighty-seven percent of financial institutions stated that their companies have experienced check fraud. One of the many ways of check fraud is simply stealing someone else’s checkbook and writing checks as if the thief was the owner of the account the checks were drawn off of. “In its 1994 Check Fraud Survey, the American Bankers Association (ABA) indicated that the volume of check fraud against financial institutions increased by 136 percent from 1991 to 1993. (Slother, 2013, p.1)” That was a large 815 million dollar annual loss to the US. Now in 2014, check fraud is in full bloom with a larger annual loss than ever before. A full eighty-seven percent of American’s have been exposed to the many forms of check fraud so far this year. With the year not quite at an end yet, it is expected that the rate will increase leaving more American’s at a loss and add to the victims of check fraud. Financial institutions reported that the check fraud for payments increased twenty-seven percent within the year. The small sixteen percent of financial...