New research has revealed the UK’s biggest business fraud hotspots

11 January 2022

The research, undertaken by anti-fraud experts SEON, has revealed the areas with the highest rates of business fraud per 100,000 people.

The research used data from Action Fraud and recorded both the total number of fraud reports in each area as well as the total number of business or corporate fraud cases. It then compared this to population data, giving relative rates of fraud and business fraud in each geographical area, allowing comparisons to be made.

For all the information, please visit: https://seon.io/resources/business-fraud-hotspots/

The UK’s Business Fraud Hotspots:

Rank	Police Force	Population	Corporate Fraud Reports	Corporate Fraud Reports per 100,000 People
1	City of London	10,900	11	100.92
2	Nottinghamshire	1,170,500	163	13.93
3	North Yorkshire	831,600	103	12.39
4	Cumbria	499,800	48	9.60
5	Hertfordshire	1,195,700	92	7.69
6	Kent	1,868,200	123	6.58
7	North Wales	703,400	46	6.54
8	Cheshire	1,069,600	68	6.36
9	Humberside	934,400	59	6.31
10	Gwent	598,200	37	6.19

The City of London has the highest rate of corporate fraud per 100,000 people in the country at 100.92 cases. This will likely come as no surprise, as the City of London is the centre of the UK’s financial industry and is home to a huge number of businesses, while also being home to a comparably small number of people.

Nottinghamshire has the second-highest rate of corporate fraud in the country, making the county a much riskier place to do business than the majority of the country.

In third place is North Yorkshire. This largely rural county is home to several well-off small cities and market towns, such as York and Harrogate, which act as business hubs for the area and are likely the focus of fraudsters’ attention in the region.

The Areas With The Most Costly Incidents Of Business Fraud:

Rank	Police Force	Corporate Fraud Reports	Corporate Fraud Losses	Average Losses per Corporate Fraud Report
1	Durham	6	£762,800	£127,133
2	City of London	11	£1,300,000	£118,182
3	Lancashire	43	£1,700,000	£39,535
4	Warwickshire	14	£545,200	£38,943
5	Merseyside	25	£599,400	£23,976
6	PSNI	54	£1,000,000	£18,519
7	Derbyshire	21	£387,200	£18,438
8	Metropolitan	305	£4,900,000	£16,066
9	Thames Valley	101	£1,600,000	£15,842
10	Greater Manchester	110	£1,700,000	£15,455

County Durham, the territory policed by Durham Constabulary, has the highest average losses per report of business fraud in the country. This huge sum is more than three times higher than every region other than second place, which it is still noticeably higher than.

In second place is the City of London. While still being much higher than the vast majority of other regions, it is perhaps surprising that the City of London did not top the leaderboard in this instance, given that it is home to the UK’s finance industry.

Lancashire is the third most expensive place to be hit by business fraud. While substantially lower than the average losses incurred in County Durham and the City of London, this figure is still high enough to put some small companies out of business altogether.

Further findings:

The City of London places top as the region most susceptible to all forms of fraud, with 143,092 reports per 100,000 people.
The second region most susceptible to all forms of fraud, with 568 reports of fraud per 100,000 people, is the area covered by Dyfed-Powys Police in Wales.
Northumbria tops the list as the most expensive part of the UK to fall victim to any type of fraud, with average losses per incident standing at £11,661.