Fraud costing Britain £30bn every year
Fraud costing Britain £30bn every year
Friday 22nd January 2010
It has been revealed that fraud in Britain costs the country over £30 billion a year, which equates to £621 for each adult.The National Fraud Authority (NFA) says fraud, which includes online theft, scams, tax frauds and insurance evaders costs about £30 billion a year.
The loss has been paid for through taxes and the rising cost of goods and services with the highest area of losses being from tax fraud costing an estimated £15.2 billion, the NFA revealed.
Around £1.1 billion was lost to the benefits system, the local government around £684 million and the NHS approximately £263 million.
Bernard Herdan, the authority's chief executive, said: "With this vital information we can develop clearer priorities to prevent, detect and deter fraudsters.
"We will use the data to help identify those areas of fraud that cause the most harm to the UK economy.
"Reducing the cost of fraud is important but even more significantly I want to stop more people from becoming victims."
It was also revealed that £9 billion was lost in the private sector, £3.8 billion by the financial services, £1 billion in mortgage fraud and finally more than £2 billion through insurance scams.
People are being urged to become more aware of fraud and take measures to prevent falling victim to a scam.
The NFA have recently launched Action Fraud which tackles problems that are reported to them from the public so the matter can be taken further by the police.
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