Last week, the SEC announced that it had paid out its first whistleblower award and that the program was coming along just grand as the Whistleblower Office said that the Commission receives "about eight tips a day" since the it started last August. That's great and all, but the internal auditors might be feeling slighted and are definitely concerned that the would-be finks will be tempted seek out the rewards offered by the SEC rather than let the companies handle things:
Richard Chambers, president and chief executive officer of the Institute of Internal Auditors, agrees that employees should have the ability to go as far as they need to in addressing fraud. But adds, “We’re concerned this could have a chilling effect, and this might become the preferred avenue for employees.” He adds that internal auditors are committed “to always seeing fraud promptly and thoroughly investigated. We believe the way to ensure allegations are addressed most expeditiously is almost always to report them internally. I am concerned that the allure of rewards will cause whistleblowers to automatically take matters outside of the company, thereby slowing down the fraud investigative and resolution process.”
Forget that you might receive 30% of the funds recovered. Please do this out of principle.
If you’re given the task of running down assets that are left over from a Ponzi scheme, you’d think somone would throw in a little something for the effort. That stolen money is going to find itself after all.