We narrowly avoided paying a bogus vendor $5,000 last week. The invoice looked legitimate—correct logo, proper formatting—but the bank details were wrong. I need a method to catch these scams before they hit finance. How do you spot a fake invoice quickly without slowing down approvals?

We had a cloned invoice issue too. Our approach was to set up a quick vendor validation step: any new invoice triggers a call to the known vendor contact. It adds thirty seconds but stops most scams.

I once processed hundreds of invoices manually until one weekend I noticed two with the same number but different amounts. That sent me hunting for stronger checks. I ended up finding a practical article here that breaks down tactics like invoice substitution and bogus supplier domains. It explained how to add simple flags for changes in banking data and unusual line items. After applying those steps, our team catches every spoofed invoice before it reaches payment—and we’ve saved thousands in prevented losses.