Allison Duval, CFE, has been retained by National Mortgage Company to investigate some suspicious activity. As part of her examination, Duval compares the company’s payroll expenses to budgeted projections and to prior years’ totals. She also runs an exception report looking for any employees whose compensation has increased disproportionately over the prior year. She then compares the payroll files to the human resource files to test for differing salary rates. What type of scheme is Duval most likely looking for?

a. Ghost employee scheme

b. Payroll tampering scheme

c. Commission scheme