Despite rigorous efforts to evade becoming victims of payment fraud, companies overall don’t appear to be making much of a dent in the problem, as scammers grow more sophisticated. 

According to a new survey from the Association for Financial Professionals, 79% of the 521 participating treasury practitioners reported their companies being targets of actual or attempted fraud activity in 2024. That was virtually the same as the 80% rate experienced the previous year, according to the report. 

The one-percentage-point drop “is not very encouraging,” AFP wrote in its survey report, considering that in 2022, only 65% of corporate practitioners reported payments fraud. “Clearly, fraudsters have not been deterred by any of the anti-fraud protections that organizations have put in place.” 

Bad actors are using AI “very effectively” in targeting their messages, according to the report, thereby hindering employees’ ability to tell fraudulent emails from authentic ones. Almost two-thirds (63%) of those surveyed reported incidents of business email compromise in 2024, with spoof emails being the most prevalent form of BEC. Additionally, 45% reported actual or attempted vendor imposter fraud. 

Some companies are using AI in their own fraud-prevention efforts, but as the report pointed out, companies’ adoption of AI tools is not yet extensive. 

The report also noted that increasingly popular methods of transferring cash instantly — for instance, Real-Time Payments, FedNow and Zelle — pose significant risks, given that the transactions are generally irrevocable. 

“Being susceptible to greater fraud with these methods could outweigh the convenience of transacting payments immediately,” AFP wrote. 

In fact, companies’ level of success at recovering losses is plummeting. In 2024, only 22% of organizations were able to recover at least 75% of funds lost to payments fraud. That was a huge decrease from 2023, when 41% of companies recouped that much. 

On the other hand, the percentage of companies unable to recover anything at all in 2024 fell to 20%, from 30% a year earlier. 

Large companies — those with annual revenue of at least $1 billion — were more susceptible to payments fraud attacks than smaller ones, 83% vs. 73%, respectively. The smaller companies also were more successful at recovering funds. 

Checks continue to be a common payment method, with 91% of those polled saying their companies used them in 2024. That actually represented a startling increase from 75% in 2023. 

“While it is unclear why check usage increased somewhat dramatically, some organizations may have been misled into thinking that check payments are safer than digital payments,” the report speculated. 

That view is “clearly false,” and in fact checks are the least secure method of payment, according to AFP. However, business leaders who are unfamiliar with new payment technologies may be inclined, in the face of scammers’ increasing technological expertise, to fall back on what they know.