Exploring Interviewing Techniques in Financial Crime Investigation

This essay delves into the crucial role of interviewing techniques in financial crime investigations. It examines how interviewing assists financial crime investigators in identifying the nature of crimes. The essay outlines the stages in planning an interview, emphasizing the importance of identifying the right interviewee and preparing relevant questions. It also discusses various types of interviewees, including accountants, auditors, tellers, and business consultants. Furthermore, the essay highlights the significance of recording interviews for creating evidence and protecting witnesses. The importance of the interview location is addressed, noting the need to choose a place that facilitates effective communication. The essay also details the stages in the interview planning procedure, focusing on the 'who, what, why, when, where, and how' aspects. Finally, the essay explores the cognitive interview technique, including mental reinstatement, perspective use, event description, and in-depth reporting, as tools for gathering accurate information from eyewitnesses.

Interviewing
Techniques

1(i) Help Provided by Interviewing to Financial Crime Investigator
A Financial Crime Investigator is a person who is able to make sure that the right
approach is adopted for the investigation of various types of financial crimes which are
conducted within an organization. With the help of interviewing the person who is doing
this work will be able to find out what type of crime has taken place by asking certain
questions.
1 (ii) First Stage in planning the interview
The first stage in planning the interview is knowing who will be interviewed
(Hardcastle and et.al., 2017). For this it is necessary to determine the particular needs
and requirements and therefore make sure that the right candidate is called for the
interview process. This is going to help the interviewer in the application of appropriate
techniques to interview a candidate.
1 (iii) Types of interviewees to be considered
These interviewees are-
 Accountants- These are the ones who are able to maintain the accounts and
keep the financial information and data of the organization quite well-secured.
 External Auditors- These people conduct the investigation of the financial
transactions of the organization.
 Tellers and Branch Managers- These people keep the daily up-to-date record of
the financial transactions in the organization.
 Business Consultants- These people provide the consultancy services and the
necessary advice to the managers of the organization.
1 (iv) Recording of the interview
Creation of evidence- When an interview is recorded it can create an evidence
for both the interviewer and interviewee so that the conflicts and disputes if any can be
settled.

Protection to the witness- Recording of the interview process can give necessary
protection to the witness (N’zi and et.al., 2017). Thus it is necessary to record the
process so that the legal matters can be solved in the correct manner if they arise.
1 (v) Importance of place
 The place of interview is important as every location has its own set of pros as
well as cons.
 The right place has to be chosen for the investigation of financial crimes because
there are certain suspects who want to be interviewed at their own location while
some of them can be interviewed out of their comfort zone.
2 Stages in interview planning procedure
These stages are as follows-
 Who?- This is the first step. In this step, the person who has to be interviewed is
determined. In the case of financial crime investigation it is quite essential that
the right person is interviewed so that the nature of crime can be found out.
 What?- This is the second step. In it, the planning is required to be done by the
interviewer regarding the questions to be asked to the interviewee. In financial
crime investigation, it becomes necessary that the interviewer prepares a specific
list of questions which can be asked so that details regarding the financial crime
can be found out.
 Why?- This is the third step. There should be a particular reason due to which an
interviewee maybe interviewed by an interviewer. Financial crime investigation
therefore requires that the reasons must be framed out before the interview can
begin. This will help in conduction of the whole process in a more refined
manner.
 When?- This is the fourth step. There should be particular time during which the
interview is conducted. In Financial Crime Investigation, there is a requirement of
choosing an appropriate time at which the interview process will be conducted.
 Where?- This is the fifth step. This refers to the place at which the interview is
conducted. Financial Crime Investigation requires that the place of interview must
be chosen carefully. This is so because conducting the investigation at the
correct place will yield the right conclusions.

 How?- This is the sixth step. This means the way in which the interview will be
conducted. Thus it is required in financial crime investigation that the right
methods and techniques are applied for the purpose of getting to conclusions.
3 Cognitive Interview
This refers to the use of certain techniques through which eyewitnesses can
remember what they saw in a particular crime scene (Tolchin and et.al., 2020). Crime
investigators make use of these techniques so that they are able to get the desired
information.
These techniques are explained as follows-
Mental reinstatement- In this technique, the investigation is done by the
interviewer to make use of their different types of senses so that they can recall what
really happened during the event. In the financial crime investigation, this can help in
getting the correct details.
Use of perspective- With the use of this technique, the investigation can be done
from the use of different type of perspective from the interviewee (Cognitive Interview,
2019). In financial crime investigation, this is really helpful in getting the right facts and
information.
Describing of event- In it, the event which has happened can be described in
different forms. In the context of financial crime investigation, the fine details are
required to be given.
In-depth reporting- With the use of this method the reporting is done in detail.
Financial crime investigation has a requirement of making the use of this particular
technique for reporting the different types of details.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals:
Hardcastle, S. J. and et.al., 2017. Identifying content-based and relational techniques to change
behaviour in motivational interviewing. Health psychology review. 11(1). pp.1-16.
N’zi, A. M. and et.al., 2017. Enhancing parent–child interaction therapy with motivational
interviewing techniques. Cognitive and Behavioral Practice. 24(2). pp.131-141.
Tolchin, B. and et.al., 2020. Motivational interviewing techniques to improve psychotherapy
adherence and outcomes for patients with psychogenic nonepileptic seizures. The
Journal of neuropsychiatry and clinical neurosciences. 32(2). pp.125-131.
Online
Cognitive Interview. 2019. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.simplypsychology.org/cognitive-interview.html>