Sergio Flores works at the drive-through window of Big & Bad Burgers. Occasionally, when a drive-through customer orders

Sergio Flores works at the drive-through window of Big & Bad Burgers. Occasionally, when a drive-through customer orders, Sergio fills the order and pockets the customer’s money. He does not ring up the order on the cash register.

Identify the internal control weaknesses that exist at Big & Bad Burgers, and discuss what can be done to prevent this theft.


Answer:
Big & Bad Burgers suffers from a failure to separate responsibilities for related operations.

Big & Bad Burgers could stop this theft by limiting the drive-through clerk to taking customer orders, entering them on the cash register, accepting the customers’ payments, returning customers’ change, and handing customers their orders that another employee has assembled. By making another employee responsible for assembling orders, the drive-through clerk must enter the orders on the cash register. This will produce a printed receipt or an entry on a computer screen at the food bin area, specifying the items that must be assembled to fill each order. Once the drive-through clerk has entered the sale on the cash register, the clerk cannot steal the customer’s payment because the clerk’s cash drawer will not balance at the end of the shift. This change also makes the drive-through more efficient and could reduce the time it takes to service a drive-through customer.

If another employee cannot be added, the weakness in internal control could be improved with more thorough supervision. The restaurant manager should be directed to keep a watchful eye on the drive-through area in order to detect when a clerk takes an order without ringing up the sale.

Another option is for Big & Bad Burgers to implement a policy that any customer who does not receive a receipt is entitled to a free burger, and advertise this policy at the cash register and drive-in window. This approach uses the customer as an internal control.