Scenario 1

Kerry owns and operates a small community pharmacy. John is the pharmacist and he employees a clerk to assist with collecting, reconciling and depositing the proceeds collected each week. Kerry leaves all the cash handling procedures to the clerk and simply confirms that cash was deposited at the end of the week.

Scenario 2

Alex is also an entrepreneur who owns a business. Alex ensures that the employee who accepts payments and issues receipts is not the same person to prepare the deposits. Deposits are prepared and reconciled by another (more senior) employee who confirms the amount of cash collected based on the cash totals (from the register, receipt book or AIS).

Required:

Compare and contrast the controls applied by the two scenarios. What improvements would you recommend?