Episode 5 Claimed and Shamed

Insurance fraud in the UK has hit epidemic levels.

It's costing us over one billion pounds every year.

That's almost 3.5 million pounds every day.

Deliberate crashes, bogus personal injuries, even phantom pets.

The fraudsters are risking more and more to make a quick killing

and every year it's adding over £50 to your insurance bill.

But insurers are fighting back,

exposing just under 15 fake claims every hour.

Armed with covert surveillance systems...

That's the subject out the vehicle.

..sophisticated data analysis techniques...

Police!

..and a number of highly skilled police units...

Police! Don't move, stay where you are!

..they're catching the criminals red-handed.

Just don't lie to us.

All those con men, scammers and cheats on the fiddle are now

caught in the act and Claimed And Shamed.

Coming up,

a gentle afternoon drive leads one unsuspecting motorist

headfirst into a crash for cash scam.

There's absolutely no reason for those brakes to come on.

This is an induced collision.

One claimant needs to brush up on his communication skills.

He couldn't stop himself calling me "love".

And a moped rider's claim falls flat.

Crucially, he wasn't at the point on the road where

he alleged the accident happened.

The City of London Police's Insurance Fraud Enforcement

Department, or IFED, is a dedicated team of detectives,

committed to stopping insurance fraud cheats.

Since IFED started at the beginning of 2012,

1,200 individuals have been either arrested or interviewed

under caution, and suspected of insurance fraud.

This elite squad has prevented millions of pounds being paid

out to criminals in fraudulent claims.

From now on, insurance cheats need to look over their shoulders.

Insurance fraud isn't easy money, it has risks and consequences.

You could get a criminal conviction and you can go to jail.

Police! Don't move, stay where you are!

As anyone who's been involved in a collision will tell you,

the aftermath can be an unpleasant and often costly experience, but

an increasing number of motorists are turning to technology to protect

themselves from being unfairly blamed in the event of an accident.

Over the last few years, as costs have come down, more and more

people have been making use of their own dashcams in their vehicles and

these are proving to be very useful for things such as insurance claims.

In the 12 months leading up to February this year,

dashcam sales increased by a whopping 918% in Britain.

They're usually seen in commercial vehicles, sat next to the

furry dice, but with cameras now costing as little

as £30, you can see why the public are starting to catch on too.

Like this driver here,

but as he took his brand-new dashboard camera out

for its maiden voyage the last thing he was expecting to happen was this.

After the accident the driver's insurance company, LV,

received a claim from the person behind the wheel of the silver car

in front, Miss Elena Khan.

The total that was being claimed for was over £26,000. And that came

about because of the cost of repair to the vehicle damaged, but also

a credit hire car to replace that car, the storage of the damaged

vehicle and to cover personal injury to Miss Khan herself.

Fortunately, the dashcam footage supplied by their customer provided

LV with the perfect eyewitness account of what had happened.

However, upon examining it, they realised something wasn't

quite right and passed the case on to the Insurance Fraud

Enforcement Department, who took up the investigation.

Khan said that she'd been driving through the town centre of

Manchester at quite a busy time of day - lots of other cars and people

around - when she'd been caused to come to an emergency stop and that

is what caused the car following her to collide with the back of her.

From what Miss Khan told her insurance company, this

appeared to be a genuine accident much like any other

that happens up and down the country every day.

After watching the footage, IFED investigators soon shared

the insurer's concerns that this was anything but a genuine accident.

There were a number of things about this claim that raised suspicions.

OK, so, as you can see, this is Miss Khan's silver Audi in front.

The road is clear in front of the silver Audi

and there it goes, the brakes come on,

but there's absolutely no reason for those brakes to come on.

There's nothing in front - this is an induced collision.

As if Miss Khan slamming on her brakes for no apparent reason

wasn't suspicious enough, the footage also highlighted something

else that pointed toward foul play.

What the dashcam footage also shows is that the following driver

had absolutely no way of avoiding a collision,

because he can't move over to the left, he's being boxed

in by another black Audi vehicle.

This is quite a classic kind of, MO. You have to have

another vehicle there to either act as a decoy, to nominally

cause the brakes to come on or to force the following vehicle -

the target - that has got nowhere else to go, so it has to crash.

As the two cars wait alongside each other at the traffic lights,

their trap was set.

And seconds after the impact,

we see the black Audi, which has been positioned alongside

the whole time, to prevent the victim from avoiding the collision.

Convinced that they were dealing with a classic case of

"crash for cash" IFED continued with their investigation.

And as they looked into Khan's car,

the evidence really began to pile up.

Part of the costs of this claim were the courtesy car replacement

vehicle for Miss Khan's Audi, a black Audi,

and the investigation revealed that the car boxing in the other

driver was the car that she later used as a courtesy car.

So not only had Khan deliberately caused the crash with

an unsuspecting driver, she also had the nerve to

claim for a courtesy car when in fact it belonged to her accomplice.

But Khan's lies didn't end there.

According to Miss Khan, her silver Audi was undriveable

and so it needed to be in storage at high expense.

When we looked at traffic cameras, it was still being driven around,

so it clearly was still driveable.

With every element of Khan's claim proving to be fraudulent,

IFED turned their attention to the claims management company, who were

pursuing the claim on her behalf, AMC Claims Ltd, in Manchester.

AMC's role was to work between Miss Khan

and the other driver's insurance company in organising things, such

as the credit hire and any medical examinations that were required.

On the face of it,

AMC Claims was a legitimate claims management company like any other.

However, further investigation revealed that

the owner of AMC Claims Ltd, Sarfaraz Ahmed,

was actually friends with the driver of the black Audi, Camran Yassin.

And that wasn't all.

The deeper we investigated into the circumstance of this collision,

the more it became apparent that it was all set up from the start

and they had a plan. The vehicles were added to insurance policies

just before this all happened and there was clear evidence that

they'd been in close contact leading up to and just after the collision.

With proof that the drivers of both Audis

and the owner of the claims management company

were in on the scam from the start, IFED arrested all three.

This web of fraud had been exposed, thanks to one trusty eyewitness.

The dashcam footage was hugely significant, it gave us lots

of lines of investigation to follow and it enabled us to confront

Ms Khan with the real circumstances of what had happened that day.

At trial, all three of those people were found guilty by a judge.

I don't think any of those three people were surprised to be

arrested, but certainly, they showed no remorse whatsoever

throughout our investigation or at court.

Justice was served when Elena Khan

received a 14 month suspended sentence, and Camran Yassin,

who was behind the wheel of the black Audi, received

a 16 month suspended sentence, along with 280 hours of community service.

The owner of the claims company, Sarfaraz Ahmed,

also pleaded guilty and awaits sentencing.

I think this goes to show that insurance fraud isn't a victimless

crime that happens with a load of paper being moved around somewhere,

it happens on our streets. It is almost like daylight robbery.

I think if these three hadn't have been stopped, they'd have

carried on orchestrating collisions on the roads

and hurting members of the public.

Sadly, in this country, we have had serious injuries

and deaths from "crash for cash" scams and that shows why it's

so important to investigate and to stop people like this.

Still to come, a pothole prang is investigated.

The nature of the pothole didn't look to us to be of the type

of severity that would cause someone to come off their bike.

And an apparent victim of theft isn't in the mood for talking.

Before we even got to discuss anything,

the customer strangely decided to terminate the call.

Increasingly, insurers are turning to dedicated

claims-handling companies.

I-cog use specialist techniques to weed out the genuine

claims from the bogus ones.

Managing Director, Tara Shelton,

has dealt with hundreds of claims over the years.

With one of the most common claims being hi-tech camera

equipment, Tara and her team have

so far saved the media industry over a million pounds. And of all

the cases of nicked kit she's dealt with, one in particular stands out.

He had hired equipment, he said, to make a music video

over the weekend, in the famous Brick Lane in London.

He reported to having made this music video

and the equipment was therefore returned to the home address

and was stored there overnight,

so that he could return the equipment as per the hire agreement.

But it was at this point our claimant's fortunes took

a turn for the worse.

When he said that he got up at 5am

for work the following morning, he'd found that the rear

conservatory had been broken into and the entire equipment that

had been hired had actually been stolen.

With almost 100 grand's worth of hi-tech kit missing,

most of us would be bending over backwards to try

and get things sorted, but not this chap.

This particular claimant was very difficult to get onto the phone.

He would make many excuses as to why he wouldn't be available to

speak with us. But we made it quite clear that the

claim couldn't progress without this call taking place, and eventually

he gave up his lunch break on one particular day to speak with us.

But rather than move his claim forward, the phone call well

and truly put the skids on it.

What he explained on the phone call was very alarming,

because he had absolutely no depth and no detail to offer about

the incident.

One example of this was what it was he actually saw,

when he came down the stairs and saw the that equipment had been taken.

Unsurprisingly,

such a vague account wasn't exactly ticking all the boxes for Tara.

But what was even more interesting about this particular

claimant is he said there were about 20 people involved in that project.

An extensive cast and crew would surely mean that Tara could

finally get some answers.

He might not have been much of a talker, but judging

by the level of cover he'd taken out,

this fella clearly knew his stuff.

This particular policy is quite a specialist scheme policy,

where it's purchased from a broker and it's predominantly for people

who actually do work in the media industry. So in other words, you

would need to be suitable for the policy by having that experience.

So it sounds like this chap was rubbing shoulders with

the likes of Spielberg.

Unlike the shelves in the warehouse, this claim wasn't stacking up.

This particular claimant had hired the equipment providing references

from the media industry to substantiate that he had

that experience.

So he doesn't remember that he provided references to hire

the kit, didn't have the right experience to hire the kit,

didn't want to give the names of his cast and crew

and couldn't provide any of the details Tara was asking for.

It was hardly going well,

but, as always, Tara was keen to keep it professional.

He couldn't stop himself calling me "love"

and I don't really like that very much.

That doesn't sound like too much of a challenge, does it?

But with nerves getting the better of him,

he just couldn't help putting his foot in it.

By now, Tara well and truly had this chap's number.

He's probably the most poorly planned fraudster I think

I've ever come across.

He was a combination of a high-stress response,

because he was lying, but also he didn't have the almost

intellectual ability to carry the story off. So he was just

almost filled with frustration inside himself for not being

able to, you know, in essence, play his role and win me over.

It just wasn't working.

Just wasn't working.

When I explained to him that I did have concerns with the claim,

he became very upset.

The net was closing in on this questionable claimant.

As ever, Tara and her team had done their homework and already

examined his finances and one transaction caught their eye.

And it was just evidently clear from the very beginning that he

was caught between us and whatever agreement

he had made about disposing of the equipment for potentially

financial gain. And we did, actually, by working

with the police, locate a large payment into his bank account,

after I had spoken to him.

The evidence was mounting,

but the claimant's biggest faux pas was still to come.

And unfortunately for him,

we proved that he wasn't filming in Brick Lane making a music video,

he was actually at work, because he'd clocked himself in and out.

Time was well and truly up for this chap.

The conclusion of this claim was the right one.

We invoked the fraud condition and the policy was void

as if it never existed.

Even those that want to try and defraud insurers

and plan and plan and plan,

think they've got their story watertight,

will still get found out.

He thought it would be easy, he thought it would be easy

and it isn't easy.

There are over 180,000 road accidents each year

and statistics say that

if you're on two wheels then you're more likely to be seriously injured.

Peter Wake is a partner at law firm, Weightmans, who represent

Halton Borough Council. And in 2010, they received a claim

from a moped rider who was holding them responsible for a recent fall.

The initial claim, brought by Mr Condrant,

was for £50,000 worth of damages. That's personal injury damages

and loss of earnings

in relation to an alleged accident on the highway when he said he'd

fallen off his moped as a result of an alleged pothole in the road.

The rider was Daniel Condrant.

And according to the details on his claim form,

the effects of the fall were long-lasting.

The injuries that he alleged were a broken right leg, alongside

psychological injuries as well.

After the accident, Mr Condrant

instructed a local firm of personal injury solicitors to bring

a claim against the council. The basis of the claim was

that his accident was caused by a pothole in the road, and therefore

he alleged the council was liable for failing to maintain the road.

Faced with a hefty bill,

and keen to avoid further mishaps with other road users, the council

took a closer look at the pothole that had caused so much damage.

There was nothing obvious to suggest that the accident hadn't

occurred as he alleged, but we were concerned

because the nature of the pothole didn't look to us to be of the

type of severity that would cause someone to come off their bike.

But Condrant wasn't having any of it

and decided to take the council to court.

Which is where Peter and his team came in.

The council instructed Weightmans to act on their behalf.

As part of our investigation, we carry out specialist fraud

enquiries in relation to background searches, investigations,

using all our systems and expertise, in an effort to identify

whether there's anything that might suggest the claim is fraudulent.

In the course of these enquires, we established that the police

had actually attended the location of the accident immediately

afterwards and therefore we were able to contact the police officer

who had been in attendance and who had prepared a police report.

As anyone who's been involved in a road accident will tell you,

a reliable witness is crucial.

She confirmed that she had been in the location after

the accident has happened and she saw Mr Condrant

at the side of the road.

So far the claim made sense.

Crucially, he wasn't at the point on the road where

he alleged the accident had happened.

He was a considerable distance away from that

point at the side of the road.

Their stories didn't quite match and, unfortunately for Mr Condrant,

the officer also mentioned a conversation she'd had with him.

He'd also confirmed to the police officer that he didn't know

what had caused the accident, but that he'd hit the kerb and skidded.

He made no mention of a pothole causing the accident or

indeed a pothole at the location that he subsequently alleged.

With evidence like that, it'll come as no surprise that Condrant's

case really did hit the skids when it got to county court.

We'd obviously produced a detailed witness

statement from the police officer. It was at that point that the

civil claim for compensation was almost immediately withdrawn.

So after the claim had been withdrawn, obviously

the council was firmly of the view that it had been a fraudulent claim.

But if Condrant thought he could just walk away from his tall tale,

he was sorely mistaken.

Very often, when civil claims for compensation are withdrawn,

the claimants will think that that's the end of the matter.

Importantly, from our perspective, where we've identified fraud,

we'll work with our clients and advise them in relation to

whether or not further avenues can be explored.

Now, Weightmans therefore advised the council about the prospects

of pursuing a contempt action against Mr Condrant,

in respect of what we both felt was obviously a fraudulent claim.

When the case was heard at the high court, Condrant

still refused to come clean.

He maintained that his accident was caused by a pothole

and that he wanted to pursue his claim.

However, he was not able to offer any plausible explanation

for either the evidence of the police officer or the contents

of the police documents, and in particular what the police officer

had recorded Mr Condrant to say at the time she'd attended the scene.

Satisfied that Condrant had attempted to defraud the

council to the tune of £50,000, the High Court judge didn't hold back.

The judge identified, in the course of contempt proceedings, what

Mr Condrant had actually done was use the opportunity to try

and make a bit of money.

The judge described Mr Condrant's actions as criminal

and referred to the very negative effect that fraudulent claims have

not just on local authorities,

but also the insurance industry and society as a whole.

The judge told Condrant that...

And he meant it.

For trying to cheat his way to a £50,000 pay out,

Condrant was sentenced to six months behind bars.

The message that this case sends out to claimants is that the courts

simply won't tolerate fraudulent claims for compensation.

As the judge confirmed in this case, people who bring fraudulent claims

and are caught should expect to go to prison.

In this day and age, most of us

can't imagine life without our trusted smartphone, but with around

300,000 phones reported stolen to the police each year in the UK,

it's easy to see why so many of us purchase mobile phone insurance.

However, when it comes to making a claim, insurers hear all

kinds of excuses, as Simon Cook from CEGA is all too familiar with.

The customer told us that while she was on holiday in Benidorm

in Spain, she unfortunately became the victim of a theft.

The customer claimed for a purse,

£300 in cash and a hire mobile phone.

By the sounds of it, this thief had got away with quite the haul.

The total value of the claim was approximately £800.

To CEGA, this was starting to look like a textbook case

of holiday pickpocketing.

As with the majority of the claims that we deal with, we had no

reason to believe this claim was anything other than genuine.

So with no time like the present, CEGA started processing the claim.

The customer provided us

with various documents to support the claim.

In addition, for any mobile phone claim,

we always ask for the IMEI number,

which is the unique reference

number that's designated to the handset being claimed.

Luckily for CEGA, they have access to a hi-tech database that

stores information on every mobile phone.

When we inputted the IMEI number into the database, it did

show that the phone was blocked. However, we also noted that the

phone was blocked four weeks prior to the theft occurring.

So the phone was blocked before she left the UK. It makes you

wonder why she would have taken her phone with her in the first place.

Due to the concerns with the claim, we did contact the customer

to ask her why the phone was showing as blocked four weeks

prior to the theft occurring.

The customer didn't really have an explanation for this,

so we decided that we were going to need to speak with

the network provider to find out what information they had available.

As you might expect, the mobile network provider was

cautious about releasing any personal information without

the customer present, but CEGA had an innovative solution.

So we decided on this occasion that we would do a conference call

between ourselves, the customer and the network provider.

When we got through to the network provider with the customer

on the line, before we even got to discuss anything with the network

provider, the customer strangely decided to terminate the call.

I suppose the connection could have cut out.

We tried to contact the customer again to get her

back on the line, but unfortunately

we couldn't get through to her.

With the claimant clearly not in the mood for talking,

CEGA got back on the blower with someone who was.

We decided to get back in contact with the network provider,

who proceeded to provide us

with various pieces of information to help us with our investigation.

They also informed CEGA about a phone call they'd had with

the claimant before she left for her holiday

that may be of interest to them.

They told us that the customer reported to them

that the phone had been stolen in the UK.

CEGA now knew for certain that the claimant's story was 100% phony.

We had no option but to decline the claim in full

and invoke the full condition of the insurance policy, which

does in fact state that if any part of the claim is found to be

invalid or fraudulent in any way, we will not pay any part of the claim.

We didn't hear anything further from the customer and, to be

perfectly honest, we would have been extremely surprised if we had.

Simon and his team had averted another potential fraud.

Insurance fraudsters probably don't realise what systems

and databases are available to the insurance industry to help

with our battle against insurance fraud.

This is a classic example of opportunistic fraud.

She certainly wasn't a master criminal.