A 400-person manufacturing unit was paying 411 salaries. Eleven of them had never existed.
The CFO of a mid-sized auto-components manufacturer noticed payroll costs creeping upward despite a hiring freeze. Internal audit found nothing — every employee file was complete, with photographs, PAN copies and attendance records. He wanted an outside eye, quietly, without alerting the HR department.
Meera's team cross-referenced payroll against provident fund filings, bank account patterns and biometric logs. Eleven employees existed only on paper: their attendance was punched in suspiciously regular patterns, their salary accounts had been opened at the same branch in the same week, and their 'photographs' traced to stock images. Surveillance on the HR executive who maintained these files documented his meetings with the branch banking agent who had opened the accounts.
The fraud had run for four years and cost the company ₹2.7 crore. Our report — bank trails, biometric analysis and surveillance logs — supported both the police complaint and the internal enquiry. The company recovered a substantial portion through settlement and now runs annual payroll verification through us.
Client names, locations and identifying details have been altered to protect confidentiality. Amounts and methods are reported as they occurred.
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