
Chapter 1 n Process and Business Failure: The High Costs of Low Quality 13
COMPANY /
INDUSTRY
OUTCOME (COSTS (REF DATE)) LOSS AMOUNT
Putnam Investments Customers withdrew $4.4B from
Putnam funds over accounting errors.
(WSJ, 2003/11/7).
$4,400,000,000
RiteAid Errors in accounting led to $1.81 B
write-down over three years.
(TN, 2002/6/22).
$1,810,000,000
Shell Fined $151.5 M for overstating oil
reserves. (WSJ, 2004/07/30).
$151,500,000
Sprint Sprint records $29.5 B loss in Nextel
write-down. Poor service and dropped
calls lost Sprint 683,000 subscribers.
(Blm, 2008/02/29).
$29,500,000,000
State of Tennessee Had to compensate wrongly convicted
man $833,000. (TN, 2004/10/05).
$833,000
Telco A Costs of poor quality eliminated over
10 years $800 M. (III Private, 2004).
$800,000,000
Telco B Losses of $50 M in un-invoiced ser-
vices (III Private, 2002).
$50,000,000
Ten Wall Street firms Fined a total of $1.4 B by SEC (mis-
leading investors) (TN, 2004/08/27).
$1,400,000,000
UBS Lost $664 M (911 M Swiss francs) due
to poor risk management data.
(NYT, 1998/11/18).
$664,000,000
UBS Lost 19.7 B Swiss francs ($17 B) in
2008 as it wrote down the value of
some debt assets and wealth manage-
ment clients withdrew money.
(NYT, 2009/5/29).
$17,000,000,000
U.K. Gov. Pension calculation errors cause some
pensioners to be overpaid by up to
£140 M with others underpaid by £100
M. (LTim, 2009/3/9). Tot £240 M x
1.45 (e