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06 Feb 2023
banking training to prevent antimoney laundering
Blogpost, eLearning creativ technologies 0 comment

Can banking training help in antimoney laundering? 

With the international environment in a precarious state, the banks must work hard and impart banking training to ensure they keep up with the antimoney laundering laws.

The black or illegal money is often earned through nefarious activities such as extortion and drug smuggling. Money laundering ensures that the black money seems to originate from legal proceeds.

Banking training must ensure that the bank employees know about money laundering.

Hence, banks and financial institutions must ensure that such money does not enter their systems. The banks must have a complete idea of where the money submitted into their bank accounts has come from.

The Bank Secrecy Act is important for banks to follow to prevent this money from getting legalized. As per this Act, all the national banks and branches of foreign banks must maintain records including name, date of birth, address etc. about their customers. When such records are maintained, no problems arise for banks. The banks must also verify such information some time after an account has been opened with them.

Going further, there are three stages to money laundering, placement, layering, and integration. 

Placement        

In the first stage of money laundering, placement which involves depositing money into banks so that it enters the financial system of a country, the criminals deposit that money into small amounts in different accounts so that it does not invoke any suspicion.

It’s because the government has prohibited deposits of large amounts to prevent any money laundering. It’s the job of the banking officials to check whether the invoices and receipts of money are original or not. Hence the first stage of placement of money laundering requires banks to be extra cautious about the origin of funds.

Therefore the banking training must ensure that the banks must do the KYC of the depositors before allowing them to open bank accounts.

Layering  

In the second stage of money laundering, called the layering, the criminals introduce illegal foreign currency into another country. In the second stage, they use the money to buy such businesses in another country. The holding period of deposits in bank accounts is a tactic to ensure that the depositors don’t withdraw the money before a period of 5 days has elapsed since opening the account.

They buy such businesses, because the criminals can show their black money proceeds to be occurring from casinos and hotels because these sources often generate a large amount of revenue. They can also show fake companies through which they have received such money, i.e., through the sales of their products or services. 

Integration 

Integration is the last stage of the money laundering business; in this stage, the criminals introduce money back into the economy. They buy real estate in a country. For example, they have to prove that they are buying this real estate with legal money and show fake purchase receipts.

The criminals withdraw the money from the local bank accounts of a foreign country and then buy letters of credit, bonds, and money orders with it. They lend that money to someone and, in exchange, get a letter of credit. Integration can also be done by purchasing luxury goods; e.g., someone can buy jewelry in another country to be sold later.

Apart from luxury goods, they could also transfer this money to a terrorist organization. 

To prevent this, for example, the UK anti-money laundering laws have prohibited withdrawing 10,000 Euros. This rule has established that the money which has originated from the terrorist countries can’t be withdrawn to the maximum of 10,000 Euros in one transaction. This law applies to all financial institutions across European Union.

If any financial institution disobeys such laws, it’s penalized by the European banking authority, which has set this law. If the money of this amount is withdrawn, it’s immediately reported to the authorities, and action is taken. 

How can banking training stop anti-money laundering? 

  • Get rid of obsolete technology:

Technology can be quite useful to banks in preventing money laundering. For example, all the banks should use similar kinds of technologies, and their systems should be integrated with one another. Integrating the data is tough when one bank operates on a different technology, like spreadsheets, and one on another, such as ledgers. Hence all banks should use cloud software to prevent such problems.

  • Research about the customer: 

Apart from the KYC process, the banks must also carry out due diligence on the customer. This implies that the information given by the customer is checked against the database. Such databases include those people who have been banned from conducting transactions in any country by their own governments. They are included in international watch Lists created by several governments. The banks must check these lists before allowing customers to open an account. 

  • Screening of weird transactions:

Banks must also check the size of transactions between them and another bank. If the transaction is more than a certain amount, they must stop it immediately. If the bank cannot regulate such transactions in time, it has to pay heavy fines. Apart from checking the size of such transactions, it must also detect who is the recipient of such funds, which could be a terrorist organization. Any black money criminal might be making such a transfer of funds earned through his so-called legitimate activities, and the bank must keep a check on it. 

  • Suspicious activity report:

Banking training for antimony laundering must involve training such officers to screen transactions of more than the permitted amount. They must also be updated with the new methods adopted by criminals to carry out transactions.

The Employees must be trained in an AML compliance program which ensures that they know how to prepare a suspicious activity report. This report has to be provided to apex financial authorities if any conspicuous transaction has happened in a bank. The transaction might not violate antimony laundering laws, but it still must be brought to the government’s notice.

This is how banks can prevent any money laundering and severe punishment by keeping due checks on transactions and their customers.

06 Jan 2023
banking training process
Blogpost, eLearning creativ technologies 0 comment

Three ways to impart banking training successfully

Banks have faced complicated situations due to the Covid 19 pandemic. It’s because people stopped visiting the banks due to social distancing. In this situation, the banks had to learn how to provide remote banking. The banking tellers had to understand how to provide good services to customers, including financial advice and back office operations, all remotely. Since banks had to shift people to those areas due to a new business need, banking training was needed. Banks had to segregate teams for specific tasks and train more active employees to handle a multiple-channel environment. All operations had to be digitalized in the covid and post-pandemic phases.

Therefore, banks had to think of ways to strategically capitalize on this change through services and products and reskill the workforce for it via banking training.

These are the effects of automation in the banking sector:

What has been the impact of automation in banking?

Banking automation has been happening rapidly, so the staff needs to be trained to cope with these changes. With the need to use lesser services, banks have been able to focus more on suggesting investment-based services. Automation in banking is getting used in many sectors, such as money transfers and purchasing travel insurance. This kind of automaton has also been happening due to smartphones through which customers are able to make transfers anywhere via net banking. Their customers can check their balance through mobile apps rather than going to the bank in person and checking it through an assistant. Hence, automation has led to the following changes in the banking system now:

  • Lesser manpower needed:

Since the requirement for banking clerks is not the same anywhere due to customers not using checks to transfer money, they had to be shifted to other roles. For withdrawals also, customers use ATMs, eliminating the need for a banking clerk. With the use of software in banking, there is no scope for errors because it knows which data has to be inputted into the system. This prevents banks from making compliance-based errors because no details about a customer are ignored. Therefore, the banks don’t commit crimes like money laundering even unknowingly. In fact, with the aid of software, banks can detect customers with riskier profiles and be more cautious about accepting their money and transactions.

The banking employees can also be made aware of any large transactions so that they can supervise who is behind them.

They can monitor the source of funds and whether they have not originated from any unscrupulous means. There is also a sanctions list of national and international organizations and governments that contains those people who are not allowed to conduct transactions in any country.

  • Adherence to compliance rules:

The bots can screen all the potential customers of a bank against such lists and ensure that no one present on them gets approved for any transaction. ATMs also didn’t replace the tellers in banks completely because someone could lose his card and ask the bank to block it, for which human discretion was needed.

When software is used to prevent antimoney laundering, it detects large cash transfers and deposits. In that case, the bank officers are notified by the program when the transaction levels exceed a minimum. The bank officers know very well what to do in such situations when they have been given banking training.

Although banks could have fired people due to the lesser services offered due to the pandemic period, they chose to redeploy them by providing banking training. Also, it’s not healthy for a brand’s reputation to lay off. So the banks have to reskill people, but how should they go about it.

 The following measures ensure that a bank’s reskilling program is successful:

Conducting a needs analysis is essential for effective banking training

When the banks do not have their reskilling targets properly decided, their decisions won’t be successful. Even employees in general roles need to be taught other roles as well. However, before making any reskilling effort, banks have to do a need analysis. It can help them know what skills are in demand in the future. For example, banks need skills for financial advice now because many of their customers want to save more than before. Since remote financial advice is a common feature of banks, it needs to train for it.

  • Skill closeness:

As far as reskilling is concerned, it has to be expedient so that banks don’t need to lose business at all. Therefore, they need to reskill those employees whose skills are the same as the roles for which the bank requires manpower. By assessing skill closeness, the banks find the best resources for training and save time and money on banking training. In fact, such kind of reskilling requires the least time(1- 2 days) and can deliver brilliant results.  It also saves the bank cost of hiring new resources.

For example, during the pandemic, banks had to do severe resource readjustment because the tellers had to act as customer representatives. A teller had to learn how to handle customer calls about products. The bank tellers were also trained to handle KYC verification because customers opened bank accounts online. The banks could only choose people for customer representative roles based on skill assessment. 

  • Introducing a learning culture:

The next element of making a banking training program successful is encouraging a learning culture. This can be done by top-level management only. The employees must be alerted about any content upload through notifications, and even senior management can participate in such initiatives.For this, the bank employees must be sent messages about the reskilling from the top management. When the employees receive messages from the top management about a banking training program, it enhances their morale.

Moreover, if the banks’ seniors assert the need for talent development, the banking employees take it seriously. The employees get the idea that the entire enterprise is committed to promoting talent development in the organization.

It’s not easy to make employees adjust to new roles; hence training should be provided consistently. Banks need the help of various elearning vendors to provide content through various channels, including emails, intranet, and webinars.The employees must be evaluated for engagement levels to know whether the L&D content is successful.

  • Involving the HR professionals:

But help from HR is also needed, which can help a bank determine the kind of talent it needs for its growth. It requires distinct skill sets to attain the right talent for its growth strategies. With adequate help from HR, the business can also recognize the right people who need training for future bank roles. It is because HR is specialized in tasks such as skill mapping. A banking training program needs to deploy the right subject matter experts to pass the right skills to the right people.

12 Dec 2022
storytelling in elearning
Blogpost, eLearning creativ technologies 0 comment

Six benefits of using storytelling in elearning

Storytelling is an intrinsic part of human culture. Generations have shared stories as heirlooms. So, it’s no doubt that it has become an inevitable part of elearning. The learners may not remember graphs and charts and their assimilated data. But they can remember a story because of its structure.

Moreover, storytelling is an interesting way to engage the audience because it takes the learners to a different environment. Employees are enthralled through simulations as they get some time away from the monotonous office environment. It’s also easy to get someone’s attention through a story because they have an element of intrigue in them.

Elearning content development companies also help organizations cash on this benefit of stories by curating those pertinent to their work processes.

Stories ensure people remember facts better; in fact, 63% of learners imbibe the data better in their minds when it’s interwoven with stories: These are the advantages of using storytelling in elearning:-

  • Get the audience hooked:

The elearning content development companies can prepare interesting storytelling scenarios for their clients.

Employees today face a lot of pressure at work for upskilling. But when the elearning module is not interesting enough, they don’t gain any knowledge. The learners’ interest can be grabbed at the beginning of the lesson when a story is told to them about another learner’s experience.

When learners listen to this story, they can learn how a subject working in a similar position faced a challenging situation.

The scenarios can help learners understand how complex situations can arise at the workplace because they contain relatable characters, or such stories can come straight from the horse’s mouth. When learners listen to someone’s experience who works in the same role, this has a profound impact on them.

Anecdotes can also be used in a module to inspire the learners because they can ensure that employees can learn how their seniors overcame problems. When senior employees share their experiences about solving problems by following a solution, they take an interest in upskilling themselves.

  • Explain facts: 

It has been found that when facts are put into stories, learners retain them better; the retention rate is as high as 20 times. You can’t attempt to influence the learners by just stating facts to them through PowerPoint slides. Therefore, storytelling is an effective medium when the management has to affect the learners to modify their behavior radically.

With genuine stories, the learners are likely to be persuaded rationally and strongly to change their work practices. The company can narrate facts to the learners about how a certain skill can increase their productivity, but when they listen to someone’s similar experience, their perception of the same skill changes.

When seniors come out in the open about professional mistakes, the learners have the highest retention. The leaders and seniors inspire others to adhere to the company’s values.

Sharing such experiences is a positive way for organizations to make employees bond with each other. Employees prevent others from committing the same errors they did through such experiences. Hence, storytelling is the best way to teach others to escape such situations scot-free.

  • Spread awareness: 

News can also be used to inspire learners. Such news can be any compliance lapses, including cybersecurity events in any organization, and have led to serious consequences for them. They can be video clippings of any real-life incident. You can teach compliance training interestingly through such videos because once learners have the backstory of how not following rules can cost a company; they are bound to be interested. 

  • Explain the relevance of laws: 

Detailed videos can also be shown to the learners, which let them know why a law came into place and how it can prevent negligence.

For example, a law regarding cybersecurity can be introduced to the learners about how it can prevent hackers from accessing the systems. It can prevent unauthorized access by only allowing designated personnel to use certain systems.

Through news bytes, the learners can learn how not following such rules has led to ransomware attacks in organizations. 

  • Instill an understanding of the company’s values:

Stories can also be used to let the learners understand why an organization follows a certain set of values. There is always a reason why an organization believes in a specific value. When the organization’s history is portrayed through simulations, employees become empathic about the values and start believing in them. Sometimes certain values of an organization are very valuable for it because they have led to its success and hence should be followed by employees at all levels. 

  • Stories spread easily:

 Also, stories do get a word of mouth publicity rather than data. Once an employee attends a training   session, he is bound to let others know about it, giving an incentive to the upskilling initiatives of the   company. An organization can’t give data to people and expect them to remember it. But they will   always remember it if data has been interspersed with a story.

29 Sep 2022
example of web based training
Blogpost, eLearning creativ technologies 0 comment

Role of web-based training safety programs in the construction industry

OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) has prescribed many standards for companies to make sure that worker safety is prioritized.

Companies, especially those in the construction industry, must ensure that the safety standards are implemented effectively through web-based training.

OSHA requires the construction industry employers to have a specific concentration of chemicals in the air (Parts Per Molecule), which should not exceed a certain limit. It has stated such concentrations of such chemicals for about 500 substances for workers in construction and other industries, including shipyard employment.

Shipyard employment also includes exposure to chemicals; hence, web-based training is required for such workers. The workers come in contact with such chemicals when they repair ships. Their work includes cutting and joining steel on various parts and plumbing, involving exposure to chemicals such as nitrogen dioxide.

What are basic safety practices for construction sites?

Construction companies must ensure that they provide information about dangerous chemicals to employees and customers. Web-based training is required for this purpose. The employees must provide proper training to workers who are required to deal with these chemicals so that no harm is caused. They must be given instructions in print to take with them to work.

OSHA has stated a hazard specification standard (safety data sheets) for chemical and construction employers to adhere to. Per these standards, each container storing such chemicals must have labels containing pictograms. The employee must find these labels understandable to handle these chemicals with care so that no acidic burns are caused. In the construction industry, adequate importance must be placed on reporting any lack of safety equipment such as PPE.

The workers should be given web-based training to use reporting systems. The construction sites must have a medical team to deal with circumstances with excessive exposure to dangerous chemicals. The web-based training can explain the proper ways to handle the chemicals through simulations where it can display how toxic exposure can harm a worker’s health and what to do in case of certain symptoms.

Difference between (Permissible Exposure Limit)PEL AND STEL(Short Time Exposure Limit)

 The construction companies must also know the permissible exposure limits (PEL) for chemicals, i.e., workers can’t be exposed to such concentrations of airborne chemicals for more than 8 or even lesser hours in a day, depending on what can be aftereffects if the chemical is inhaled.

The companies must know that they are supposed to follow the PEL values of concentration of chemicals in the air, but if it’s exceeded, it’s not to be more than STEL. This STEL refers to the Short Term Exposure Limit, which implies how much hazardous substance (time-weighted average) is present in the air for a short period of exposure of 15 minutes. This cannot happen for a duration of 15 minutes or more and should only happen a maximum of 4 times. Moreover, there should also be a time duration of 60 minutes elapsed between such exposures.

If the amount of substance is higher than STEL during such time, then it can prove to be toxic to the worker’s health. The STEL exceeding the PEL rule is applicable when the amount of substance in the air is not constant during the day.

For example, OSHA has made it mandatory that the PEL for carbon monoxide in the air is 50ppm for an 8-hour work schedule. 

What are Safety Data Sheets?

OSHA requires companies to have a mandatory Safety Data Sheet. The safety data sheets, which have a 16-section format, must also be explained to onsite construction employees to ensure they face no trouble.

In Section 8 of the Safety Data Sheet, there should be the inclusion of the PEL, as prescribed by OSHA.

These Safety Data Sheets must be compulsorily prepared either by the construction industry employer or the chemical importer or manufacturer. 

This data sheet must also contain useful information for workers while picking up containers with dangerous chemicals. So, Section 3 must include data about the ingredients of these chemicals. Moreover, if any spill happens, comprehensive information must be included in section 4 of the data sheet, like how to recognize symptoms and how one should take care of the victim because any delayed response can be life-threatening. The symptoms can be acute or severe, and Section 4 must cover the responses to both situations.

Section 5 must include details about how to douse fires caused by chemical leaks. There should also be measures on how to wipe such chemicals in case any spill happens, included in Section 6 of the Safety Data Sheet.

Although a Safety Data Sheet is mandatory, workers might not have everything ingrained in their memory, and any forgetfulness and negligence in such cases can cause problems. Hence, simulation-based videos must also supplement such a Safety Data Sheet to produce better results.

Consequences of non-compliance 

The company can lose not only valuable man-hours if workers sustain injuries due to inhaling such chemicals, but also neurological injuries can be caused to workers, making the company liable to pay massive damages. A company must also maintain that laws are followed pertaining to such dangerous chemicals. It should have evidence regarding the management controls to handle the risks related to the release of such chemicals. 

We Creativ Technologies have prepared multitude of detailed videos for our clients including simulations about the OSHA compliance standards.

15 Sep 2022
web training
Blogpost, eLearning creativ technologies 0 comment

What should be included in fraud awareness web training?

Retail companies must be quite observant about preventing fraud involving money loss. The companies must ensure that they have proper controls in place to prevent the skimming of funds by employees.

Hence, all Employees should know the basic accounting principles and how to enter transactions into the computer so that the company can reduce dependence on a single person, which increases the scope for fraud.

The companies should also see that instead of a single approving authority, there should be multiple authorities to ensure proper vigilance before any expenses are approved.

In fact, there should also be a reconciliation of accounts, including bank statements, and multiple employees should be trained, so that any fraud can be detected in time.

  • Handling internal frauds through web training 

Any employee who is handling the company’s expenses and is responsible for issuing checks must be monitored so that he is not doing the fraudulent activity. They should not use credit cards for making payments without the knowledge of higher-level personnel.

In a retail company, invoicing requires a lot of supervision because employees might be issuing checks when the goods have never been properly received.

The companies, therefore, must have web training to ensure that invoicing is done properly, and the payments are only issued once the stock has been counted as per the bill.

There should be proper controls so that the payments are not released for damaged goods. If any employee suspects that fraud invoicing is being done, that payments are being made for goods or services not supplied, then it’s his job to notify the management.

But sometimes, the whistleblower might be accusing someone because of his malice against the alleged perpetrator. Also, anyone who wants to report something wrong happening within the premises should be promised confidentiality so that he knows his identity will be concealed. 2D simulations in web training are the best way to teach employees how to respond in situations where they detect something unacceptable is happening in an organization.

The seller can also provide the buyer with inflated bills. Then it’s the job of the employees to check the company is incurring the right expenses and not paying more than the actual prices.

  • Kickbacks:

Sometimes, when a single person is involved in approving the invoices, it can cause him to get some kickback (bribe) so that he consents to the wrong bill provided by the seller and pockets in some of his profits. Kickback is a common practice in government organizations, where a person in a position to approve the winner of tenders and government contracts receives kickbacks so that he chooses one contestant over another

  • Handling external frauds: Transactions done through identity thefts

But when it comes to external fraud, the companies must be more watchful. The company should also be judicious about payments from the buyers because the cashier should verify the credit card at the point of sales transactions.

Many companies are victims of fraud when someone takes credit using identity fraud, and the company is left with staggering bills with nobody to hold responsible. An employee should ask for proof of identity verification before accepting customer payments. However, a customer wants to make payments through a credit card but has no way to prove that it’s his card, then an employee should inform the management.

There are some red flags which the employees of retail companies can use to discover identity theft. Retail companies have been extending credit to customers to facilitate sales for customers who don’t have the available cash with them. But the businesses also face a risk when customers don’t pay their credit card bills, causing them to lose their sales receipts. This can happen to retail stores where such identity thieves use credit cards.

The stores suffer when the genuine owners of such stolen cards refuse to pay the sales bills. There should be systems to check the identity of such customers because the liability lies with the merchant when the customer is making a cardless payment in an online retail store. Hence, the employees who conduct ecommerce transactions must ensure that the customers using their credit card numbers must be verifiable.

Only web training can empower the employees of such companies to use the systems in place. There can be geolocation systems embedded in the ecommerce websites which ensure that the customer’s location is tracked when he is using the credit card.

Such systems allow the company to know whether a real credit card owner is using the instrument to make a payment and not someone who has stolen his identity.

The retailers must have web training so that employees at the point of sales terminals also use chip card reading machines for reading cards with the anti-fraud microchip. Credit cards started getting embedded with such security chips in 2015. The customer liability is not more than 50 dollars in such transactions.

If the business is not using that machine and somehow comes across a stolen credit card, then the fraudulent transaction is the business’s liability, not the bank’s.

Gift card fraud happen when someone uses unauthorized gift card details.  It can cause problems because the one whose gift card has been used can ask for a chargeback from the company. That’s why; store clerks must ensure that they verify the physical copy of the gift card before accepting it. A customer who just has the gift card details can’t be allowed to use it.

  • Wardrobing:

In the retail industry, a very common problem called Wardrobing is faced by employees when customers return used products.  It can happen when an employee fails to recognize that the item has already been used because it has a tag and approves it for a refund. Hence, the stores can ensure that this problem is eradicated when the store clerks are trained to recognize the signs of usage and don’t accept returns for such items. Once trained about the return policy, including how returns are to be accepted, employees can prevent losses to a retail store because such used items can’t be resold. 

Hence, web training for using such card reading machines is essential for retail stores to avoid identity theft-based transactions.

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He was a German psychologist who is known for discovering the forgetting curve. According to this curve, the biggest decline in memory happens within 20 minutes, and then 1 hour.