IFED zero in on fraudsters
The Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department (IFED) is cracking down on motor insurance fraud by sending detectives to a number of addresses in Scotland.
IFED officers will turn up at addresses it suspects are being used by ghost brokers to get fraudulent car insurance deals.
Detective chief inspector Oliver Little said, ‘If you’re receiving mail and insurance documents addressed to somebody you don’t know or doesn’t live at your address, then it could be part of a bigger fraud.
‘We don’t want people to just ignore these letters and anyone receiving mail like this should call the insurer which is listed on the envelope and ask to be put through to their fraud department.’
Residents in Aberdeen, Inverness and the Isles of Skye and Harris will be visited.
The fraud is perpetuated once false address details are provided and a quote obtained. The ghost brokers then forge or alter cover letters to show the real address of the victim. These are then sent back to the victim making them think they have valid insurance cover in place, when in fact, they are left with policies that are not legal or with no insurance at all.
IFED said one of the tell-tale signs of this happening is that residents in rural areas may receive letters from insurers that are addressed to people that don’t live there.
To help combat this, residents are being advised to: carefully check all the letters you’re receiving in the post and to whom they are addressed; if you’ve received insurance documents sent to somebody with no connections to your address, then call the insurer they’ve come from and ask to be put through to their fraud department.
Anyone who thinks their address is being used by ghost brokers should call Action Fraud on 0300 123 2040 or the Insurance Fraud Bureau’s Cheatline on 0800 422 0421.
