OFFICE SUPPLY VENDOR PAYS $545K FINE TO STATE OF MA.

[Anonymous]

http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/stories/2009/06/01/daily37.html
W.B. Mason settles with AG, pays $545k
WB Mason agrees to $545000 settlement with Mass.
Office
supply vendor W.B. Mason Inc. will pay $545,000 in a settlement reached
Tuesday with Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley’s office.The
settlement with the Brockton, Mass.-based company resolved allegations
that its accounting practices led to the mishandling of
business-customer credits and improper write-offs by W.B. Mason,
according to Coakley’s office.

In addition to paying the state
$545,000, of which $5,000 will pay for costs associated with the
investigation, W.B. Mason is prohibited from engaging in any accounting
process that results in depriving customers of valid credits due. In a
prepared written statement, W.B. Mason said it “is pleased to have
resolved this matter. The credits referenced in the settlement were all
issued prior to 2004 and, according to an independent national
accounting firm, the majority of the credits were not valid and were
never owed to the customers.”

The Attorney General’s Office
began investigating W.B. Mason in 2008 after learning that W.B. Mason
used accounting processes and software that routinely allowed for aging
credits to be removed from business-customer accounts. W.B. Mason is
overhauling its electronic accounting systems to ensure that credits
are no longer deleted from customer accounts.

[Author]

June 5, 2009 at 3:12 PM