1. Observe disciplines and laws, and do not break the law or take the initiative to commit crimes
Breaking the law yourself is the most direct and avoidable risk. Complying with disciplines and laws is the professional ethics of every staff member. As long as they abide by the law and do their job conscientiously, this so-called legal risk will disappear.
For financial personnel, intentional crimes are mostly manifested in imitating leaders’ signatures to commit corruption, misappropriation, embezzlement, providing false reports, evading state taxes, etc. For example, a cashier intercepts income, an accountant privately seals a seal and transfers company funds to his own private account, a financial director proposes to privately divide state-owned assets in the name of employee welfare at the company office meeting and it is passed and implemented, and there is also misappropriation of public funds. This resulted in the company losing funds, absconding with the money, etc. The occurrence of this phenomenon is mainly the result of financial personnel's selfish desires, desperate taking of risks, or excessive fluke mentality.
Being able to keep accounts should not be reflected in this kind of thing, making false accounts for one's own selfish desires. The result of active crime must be severe legal sanctions. Of course, if you wake up halfway and turn around, the law will still give you a lighter sentence for those who voluntarily surrender.
However, although the phenomenon of financial personnel embezzling public funds exists, it is only a minority after all. In most cases, it is done under coercion.
2. If you are forced to break the law, you must leave favorable evidence
Financial personnel are more often a link between the previous and the following. In order to survive, they will do whatever the leader tells them to do. The most common ones are, for example, when a business owner asks that part of his income not be recorded in his account to evade taxes, provide false statements to defraud bank loans, etc. The money saved can be used to increase employee benefits. You said, for a small accountant, the boss said that he should do this, but it is obviously wrong and illegal, so should he do it or not? According to Uncle’s incomplete statistics, most accountants still do things against their will, right? And when a problem occurs in the company, the leader who caused it will jump out and stay out of the matter, shifting all the responsibilities to the financial personnel, and the accountant changes from an accessory to a principal offender.
In fact, in the law, those who are truly "forced" will not be subject to legal punishment. Of course, there will be minor penalties depending on the circumstances; therefore, as long as there is evidence to prove that you are forced, you will be punished. It can effectively reduce the legal risks of accountants themselves. At most, it is a violation of accounting professional ethics. But the main problem is that financial personnel usually don't know how to effectively protect themselves, how to have strong evidence to prove the fact that they are "forced", and sometimes they have no awareness of such self-protection at all, thus putting themselves in trouble. Caught in risk.
In fact, when you are threatened by your boss, you can record it if possible. Especially when you are on the phone, recording is the most convenient; secondly, your conversation should be exposed to the company’s surveillance cameras. Of course, many leaders will also pay attention to guarding against these points. At this time, accountants can only reduce risks by retaining bills or keeping journals. Although the diary is not an objective evidence, the records over the years can also be used as a reference for the case record. Therefore, when accountants or other financial personnel receive improper instructions from their superiors and have to do it, remember to leave as much as possible as a precaution.
3. There must be no less procedures that need to be followed, and do not change the name of the signature.
Sometimes the procedures to be followed for financial reimbursement may be complicated, and the leader or manager may need to sign something. Yes, at this time, as an accountant, you must not sign on behalf of the leader to save trouble. Otherwise, if something goes wrong, you will have to take the blame.
Just like the crime of coercion mentioned in point 2, you must be even more careful when signing. Because usually after business owners evade taxes, part of the remaining money is used as employee benefits, and part of it may be kept for themselves, or to build a company's small treasury to facilitate the use of funds for trivial matters, etc. At this time, the accountant of the small bank that is in charge of this large amount of money must pay attention and try not to keep any cash. If you must keep it, don't keep too much. For all expenses and other expenses, those who should provide bills must still provide them. A signature is still required to collect the signature. If bank transfer is possible, try to transfer it via bank transfer. Especially when the boss withdraws money, the amount is usually relatively large, so bank transfers can leave a check stub for later reconciliation.