Dr. Don Lewis: How to Avoid Embezzlement in the Office Setting

People in the field of dentistry and oral surgery often have a very specific skillset, and trust the running of their practices and their financial management to office managers and other staff. The problem is that when you stop paying attention, you make it easy for people to steal from you. Today’s guest understands this all too well. Dr. Don Lewis was the victim of embezzlement when his office manager stole thousands of dollars out of his practice over the space of three and a half years. Dr. Lewis is an Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeon as well as a Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery at Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine. After his unfortunate experience, he is now also a certified fraud examiner. In this episode, Dr. Lewis shares how he came to be a victim of embezzlement and what red flags he overlooked before explaining how you can avoid becoming a victim like him. Tuning in you’ll hear about the top five things to look out for that suggest an employee may be embezzling, how fraud can make your patients feel like victims too, the importance of looking at reports, and many other helpful tips to protect yourself. To find out the most common ways people can steal from you, what controls to implement to prevent this, and what to do if you discover fraud in your practice, tune in today!

Key Points From This Episode:

• The story of how Dr. Don Lewis’s office manager embezzled money out of his practice.
• A red flag that Dr. Lewis overlooked at the time of the embezzlement. 
• Thoughts on having a healthy level of suspicion with the people you work with. 
• The first of Dr. Lewis’s two main internal controls that you can implement in your practice: the diversification of duties.  
• The second main internal control: insist that your staff take vacations.
• How to overcome pushback when staff don’t want to learn each other’s roles.
• How to educate yourself about the computer and payment systems used in your practice. 
• The importance of looking at reports.
• The most common way someone can steal from you in the office setting: the zero charge.
• Some of the other ways people can siphon off your money.
• How this can impact the patients and leave them feeling like victims too.
• How Dr. Lewis grew as a person and benefited from this unfortunate experience. 
• What to do to prevent fraud. 
• Internal controls involving computer security.
• The top five things to look out for that suggest an employee may be embezzling. 
• How greed, ambition, and arrogance play out in embezzling. 
• What to do if you discover fraud in your practice: hire a certified forensic accountant.
• Learn about how basketball officiating helps Dr. Lewis with his oral surgery skills in the rapid-fire questions. 

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Dr. Don Lewis — https://www.ohsurgery.com/meet-us/meet-the-doctor/dr-donald-p-lewis-jr/ 

Zygomatic Implants From A To Z — https://4minstitute.com/product/zygomatic-implants-from-a-to-z-cadaver-lab/ 

4MInstitute — https://4minstitute.com/ 

Dr. Grant Stucki Email — grantstucki@gmail.com

Dr. Grant Stucki Phone — 720-441-6059