Fraud Prevention: Scarborough Council saves almost £40,000 as fraudsters target public funds

Investigations have led to fraud savings of £38,000 being generated for the authority in 2022/23 according to internal auditor Veritau.

The authority’s audit committee will discuss the findings at an upcoming meeting on Thursday, March 23 which is set to be Scarborough Council’s final meeting before the authority is abolished on April 1.

A report prepared for the meeting states that of the overall savings, £10,000 relates to a “falsely claimed Covid-19 grant payment” while ten people have received warnings about their conduct as a result of investigations by the team.

An investigation by Veritau found that a Scarborough resident who was claiming local support for council tax had not informed the council that they had a second job and a private pension.

After the correct financial information was obtained following checks against HMRC records it was found that “the resident had not been eligible to receive the council tax support since the start of their claim.

The resident was issued with a £3,000 revised council tax bill which has been repaid in full, according to the report.

In the case of Covid-19 related grants and small business rates relief looked at in Scarborough, the majority related to holiday let businesses where the other property was located in another North Yorkshire district.

In 2022/23, six business owners received written warnings about their claims and since April 2020 investigative work identified £41,000 of incorrectly claimed small business rates relief of which 88 per cent has been repaid to Scarborough Council.

April’s local government reorganisation has also been a focus for the auditor which provides services to the county’s district and borough councils.

A new unitary authority, North Yorkshire Council, will be formed in April and Veritau “has worked with all councils to ensure that strong counter fraud policies and procedures are in place when the new authority forms”.

The report concludes that fraud is a “significant risk to the public sector” and the Government estimates that the taxpayer loses up to £51.8bn to fraud and error in public spending every year.