The scale of business fraud in the UK Research into business fraud between 2018 and 2020, published belatedly in May 2023 by the Home Office as its latest Economic Crime Survey, estimated that the annual cost of fraud may be as much as £8.4bn. Extrapolating the data forward to 2023, the report estimates that UK businesses will have suffered 4.5m
The economy is wallowing but fraudsters are busy The signs of an embattled economy are everywhere to be seen, despite the ongoing debate about whether or not the UK will avoid a recession in the final quarter of this year or in 2024. Economic indicators GDP is stagnating The best the UK economy could manage in the latest GDP statistics
Our latest report into the finances and prospects of the hospitality sector published earlier this month showed that the industry’s borrowings had fallen by 18% in the last fourteen months. Only the very smallest pub, bar and restaurant businesses saw their debts rise and then only marginally. While debts still remain higher than pre-pandemic, this drop is nevertheless welcome news
Zombie companies with negative balance sheets and surviving only through the indulgence of their creditors have long been a worrying feature of the UK economy, creating unlevel playing fields for healthy competitors and acting as a drag on GDP growth. Our research in June 2022 revealed that there were 257,150 UK registered companies with liabilities that exceeded their assets by
There are many ways in which Directors can be made to contribute towards the losses suffered by creditors when a company fails. The best known being Wrongful Trading. Less common are actions for Fraudulent Trading and Misfeasance. The 2020 Finance Act gave HMRC draconian powers to recover unpaid company tax liabilities from Directors. Directors who have taken illegal dividends and
In this monthly update, we take a closer look at the latest UK economy stats and discuss what they may mean for UK businesses in the coming month. UK GDP However much the Office for National Statistics fiddles about revising past GDP numbers by a few tenths of a percentage point, the reality is that the UK economy is bumping
