Urgent payment request from the boss by phone or video

General information, not legal or financial advice.

A voice or a face on a call can be copied. Recognising the person is not a check. The check is the number you already have and a word only the two of you know.

Fixed response

1. Say: “I will call you right back on your usual number.” Then end the call or leave the video meeting. Do not stay on to be talked out of it.
2. Call back the number saved in your own phone or company records for that person. Not a number given during the call, and not a number from a message sent just before.
3. Ask for the passphrase that you agreed in advance. If the person cannot give it, do not act on the request. Tell the owner or the second approver.
4. Get a second person to approve any payment that was requested this way.
5. Write it down: date, time, what was asked, what you did.

Set up in advance (do this now, not during the call)

• Agree a passphrase with each person who can ask for payments. Do not send it by email or message. Say it in person or by a phone call you started.
• Agree who the second approver is.
• Agree that nobody will be blamed for hanging up and calling back, even if the caller was the real boss.
• Change the passphrase if you think it was overheard or written somewhere others could read it.