Source · Select Committees · Work and Pensions Committee
Recommendation 4
4
Paragraph: 19
The real scale of pension scamming is undoubtedly much larger than the £30 million reported...
Conclusion
The real scale of pension scamming is undoubtedly much larger than the £30 million reported to Action Fraud, the UK’s national reporting centre for fraud and cybercrime, between 2017 and August 2020. We have even heard examples of individual cases with losses potentially larger than the total amount reported to Action Fraud in those three and a half years. The Pension Scams Industry Group, a voluntary body set up to tackle pension scams, estimates that £10 billion has been lost by 40,000 people to pension scams since 2015. The situation is likely to be getting worse rather than better: scammers in all industries look to take advantage of new situations and covid-19 potentially offered them new opportunities.
Paragraph Reference:
19
Government Response
Acknowledged
HM Government
Acknowledged
The City of London Police (CoLP) are the National Lead Force for fraud, and responsible for the delivery of the Action Fraud Service. They are an active member of Project Bloom and report into them on a regular basis. The Government has strong existing governance and monitoring processes in place for holding the CoLP to account for the delivery of the Action Fraud Service. Alongside routine programme monitoring, this governance includes implementation of actions addressing the recommendations from Sir Craig Mackey’s independent review of Action Fraud to deliver a better service, and monitoring the recommendations on the police response to fraud, as set out in Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Service’s (HMICFRS) inspection. Given the level of monitoring already undertaken as part of policing’s operational delivery, it is in our view unnecessary to provide additional reporting to Parliament. Instead, we believe the oversight should remain with the Government.