This article will look at the recent case of CCP Graduate School Ltd v National Westminster Bank PLC & Anor [2024] EWHC and the questions that arise from that judgment including whether an obligation exists on banks to pursue the recovery of funds following an authorised push payment fraud i.e. the “retrieval duty”.
A new report sheds light on how banks are handling authorised push payment (APP) scams and reimbursing victims. This is the first-ever comprehensive data collection on APP scams, allowing consumers to compare how different banks performed.
In our article “One step ahead: how fraud survives bankruptcy” published in July 2023, we discussed the tactics used by fraudsters to hide assets to avoid payment of any judgment against them.
Undue influence has the ability to have a huge impact on the enforceability of a contract, for example, where the victim of a fraud has been pressured by someone in a position of influence over them into providing a personal guarantee under a loan agreement.
Breach of confidence or breach of confidential information is when an individual or a company discloses information that is known, or ought to have been known (express or implied,) to be confidential and that information is for a restricted purpose and the recipient then uses it without consent. It can arise in either the law of contract or equity (being an action to prevent extreme unfairness).
By its very nature fraud is about dishonesty for personal gain. Dishonesty often continues beyond any judgment against the perpetrator, and fraudsters often have a number of tricks up their sleeve to evade payment of any judgment debt.
This article explores the role of the Financial Ombudsman Service where individuals have found themselves the victim of an authorised push payment.
Fraudulent criminal gangs are targeting growing numbers of students who are struggling to make ends meet amidst the sustained rise in the cost of living.
What is APP fraud? APP (authorised push payment) fraud occurs when someone is tricked into sending money to a fraudster posing as a genuine payee. There are many ways a fraudster will seek to do this, for example through intercepting emails, posing as a genuine business, sending links to fake websites via email or text message and cold calling. According to UK Finance, APP fraud has, for the first time, surpassed card fraud with GBP 355 million in losses attributed to APP fraud in the first half of 2021.
Economic crime covers all types of financial crime including fraud, money laundering, counterfeit currency, bribery and corruption. According to recent statistics from the Office of National Statistics, fraud and computer misuse is now greater than all other types of crime put together. Action Fraud reported a 36% rise in fraud offences for the year ending June 2021, compared with the previous year.
The Government’s Economic Crime Plan 2019 to 2022, published in July 2019, described economic crime as a “…significant threat to the security and prosperity of the UK…” impacting “…all of our society including our citizens, private sector businesses and the government.” At that point fraud was one of the most common crimes in the UK and who could have predicted what was to come?
In spite of the Government’s Economic Crime Plan, economic crime continues to be a major and rapidly growing problem in the UK. We take a look at what steps are being taken to tackle economic crime.