Internet fraudsters (phishers) who try to trick online users into passing over bank/creditcard/other private details over the web are moving up the food chain and attacking high net worth individuals. More sophisticated individuals surely won't get caught out by these scams, I hear you ask.

Well, last month, thousands of senior US executives were targetted with e-mails that looked like official court summonses from a court in San Diego. They were told to click on a link to download the full court summons. Anyone who followed the link unwittingly downloaded and installed key logging software that recorded their passwords and computer use and sent it to the phishers. A second piece of software enabled the gang to control the computer remotely. Hundreds were caught out.This scam led the New York Times to coin a new phrase  for phishers who target upmarket individuals- "whalers"!

The message is clear. Organisations can't rely totally on IT guys to combat Internet scams but must train all staff (even senior executives!)to be aware of the technological, commercial and legal risks and need to develop programmes to stop phishers from being successful.

Buying credit reports on small businesses often leads to buyer frustration, as the level of available data on small private firms is "limited" so to speak. Some companies, though, have found a way of making credit decisioning easier on this type of business- they do an additional consumer credit check on the business owner at his home address.

I was informed by a Graydon customer the other day that he had bought a business report from Graydon showing a clear credit picture, then bought a consumer report via Graydon's consumer gateway on the man that owned the business and discovered 10 CCJs against the person registered at his home address. Result- an easier decision!

To do this , however, credit departments must ensure that their credit application forms include a request for permission to check out the individual behind the business in keeping with Data Protection law.

Research in the credit arena continues to point to the fact that SMEs should be doing more to protect themselves from bad debt, and protracted payments from customers. I read some research over the weekend  suggesting that 50% of SMEs continued to deliver goods on credit terms to debtors when unpaid debts were already over 90 days old. Secondly, only 3% of the respondents in this study said they turned to a debt collection agency for help, but when they did, debts were already on average 11 months old. The interesting aspect of this research was that it was looking into trade supplier habits involving companies that had gone bust leaving those suppliers with write offs. Once again, it looks as if there is an imbalance between SME enthusiasm for chasing sales revenue, and unwillingness or lack of expertise in making sure those sales are paid for.   

Just hours after the publication of the Competition Commission's final report into the Grocery trade, some supermarkets were beginning to bleat on about how the costs of organising and paying for an Ombudsman to police activities in the sector would lead to increased prices in the shops for the consumer. However, the supermarkets already accept that some things do have to get in the way of delivering lower and lower prices to end users. For instance, I'm sure child labour in overseas sweatshops would help to reduce prices of goods on the shelves, but no one, including the supermarkets, accepts this as an ethical way of trading. The Ombudsman has been recommended by the CC because it thinks the supermarkets have continually and unfairly transferred excessive risks and unexpected costs on to their suppliers. Shouldn't this be seen by the supermarkets as unethical trade practice too? A touch of sour grapes methinks.

The OFT doesn't seem to be able to leave the Supermarket giants alone lately! This week, we should see the publication of the final recommendations from the Competition Commission in to the Grocery Trade ( read supermarket chains), after the OFT referred the matter to the CC in 2006. Will an Ombudsman for the trade be recommended or not? That's one of the big questions that will soon be answered. Then last week, almost in preparation for this one, we learn that the OFT has launched an investigation into cigarette and toiletries price fixing amongst the large supermarket chains and the cigarette manufacturers. At this rate,Tesco and the like will soon be developing a serious bunker mentality. Why is it ,they ask, we do everything we can to help consumers yet get all this criticism? Any suggested answers from anyone?

Companies House continues to warn companies about the need to be vigilant concerning identity theft. However, company hijackings of bona fide companies continue apace- I've just been told by Graydon colleagues of one Middlesborough based company that was shocked to discover its registered office had changed without consent, its directors had resigned and been replaced with new ones , and a set of fictitious 2006 accounts had been filed at Companies House too to complete the scam.

I bet the real director was wondering whether he had suddenly lost his marbles or was suffering from a severe case of amnesia- either way, it just shows what can happen to a corporate identity if you don't make regular checks of your file at Companies Registry. 

Small businesses suffering from the double whammy of tougher borrowing opportunities from banks because of the credit squueeze, and delayed late payments from customers, are urging the Government to rethink their legislative approach to the latter in order to safeguard future cash flow. Not every business can afford invoice discounting  or factoring in order to have a healthy inflow of cash, and small suppliers are reticent about adding interest charges to overdue bills as allowed under the Late Payments of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act of 1998 because they fear reprisals from large clients taking business elsewhere. It's a bit like giving an eight stone man a pair of boxing gloves and inviting him into the ring with a heavyweight without a referee- there can only be one winner in that type of bout.

The 1998 Act doesn't work, and large companies in particular are holding onto suppliers money for longer and longer (after all, it's the cheapest form of finance).  What can be done? Recent Interest rate cuts are helpful to businesses, but if a trade supplier's money is in its bank account instead of in it's client's accounts, the need for additional bank borrowing may not exist at all.

I read another critical article in the FT at the weekend about Alliance Boots extending its payment terms to suppliers to 75 days from the end of month invoice date, thus squeezing the cash flow of countless numbers of smaller British businesses.

Alliance Boots and other large corporations publish an awful lot about their Corporate Social Responsibilty policies, and what they do to make the world a better place. Boots for instance talks on its CSR website about  its belief that it has an "enormously valuable role to play in promoting the health of our nation", and also believes in treating its customers "fairly".

So are suppliers not important stakeholders in the Boots business? Why no mention that they, like customers, should be treated fairly?  Does anyone think about the social and economic impact of not paying suppliers on terms that they can live with? Does big business worry about smaller companies going to the wall with cash flow difficulties, or the fact that business people who run small businesses will suffer stress and anxiety as a result of their actions?

If they do worry, there is no evidence of it unfortunately... which means that business credit squeeze anger amongst the SME community will continue to grow I'm afraid.

Back on January 16th in my blog, I questioned whether BDO Stoy Hayward were right when they said the credit crunch was likely to cause an increase in fraud. How many usually decent and law abiding business people would be driven through desperation to become felons?

Yesterday, the turmoil in the stock market caused by malicious rumours in the city caused HBOS share values to fall by nearly 20% at one point. Were these rumours driven by fear or plain greed? Others are saying that the rumours may have been started by someone purposely setting out to make a fast buck to make up for significant losses in recent months suffered by hedge funds and others. Short selling is quite legal of course but market manipulation is a criminal offence because it is a type of fraud. It will be interesting to see if the FSA will ever find out who started the rumours and why. 

Another commentator said on the radio this morning " When the going gets tough, the fraudsters get going". Maybe BDO Stoy Hayward are right!