Fraudulent Invoicing for Ricoh Consumables

In the world of industrial supplies fraudulent invoicing arises fairly often. In the copier industry specifically, these types of operations are nicknamed “toner pirates” whereby they systematically invoice businesses for supplies that have not been purchased by these businesses.

In fact, the information that they use for the basis of their invoices (namely, business name, address and copier model) is deceptively easy to obtain. In many cases, they contact the business directly and obtain the basic copier model; then they issue their invoice. In 2002, the Competition Bureau of Canada issued a warning about exactly this type of situation. It is found at the following link:

http://www.competitionbureau.gc.ca/eic/site/cb-bc.nsf/eng/00264.html

The actions of such “toner pirates” do constitute fraud, but we at Ricoh Canada are not able to take additional steps unless you would like us to pass along the fraudulent invoice to law enforcement authorities for any additional investigation on their part into this fraud.

The best manner in which to combat these types of schemes is to keep the applicable individuals within your business well informed that your service agreements with us include toner and that these types of invoices should be discarded.