The days between Christmas and New Year are when fraud has room to breathe. The people who would normally spot something wrong are away, replies are slow, and an urgent-looking request is easy to wave through because everyone wants to get home. None of the four jobs below take long, and together they mean you come back to a business rather than a mess.

First, payment approvals. Decide now who, if anyone, can approve a payment over the break, and set a firm limit above which nothing moves until you are back. Tell whoever is around that ‘it can wait until January’ is always the right answer to an urgent payment demand, because over closedown, urgency is a warning sign rather than a reason to hurry.

Second, out-of-office wording. Keep it warm but unhelpful to a fraudster: say you are closed and when you reopen, but do not name who is handling money or give a mobile number a stranger could use to apply pressure. Third, device charging - a laptop or phone that dies flat over two weeks can miss the security updates that land quietly in the background, so leave key devices plugged in and switched on if you safely can.

Fourth, and easily forgotten, the alarm and the keys. Know who holds the alarm code and the keys, make sure at least two trusted people can get in if something goes off, and remove access for anyone who has left. Do these four before you lock the door and the only thing waiting for you in January is the washing-up from the party.