Given the record number of investment scams being launched on the British public, revelations today of mistreatment of victims by Action Fraud are deeply dispiriting.
Callers, some of whom had lost their life savings, were mocked, ignored and misled that their complaint would be taken seriously. Reported crimes were filed away never to be looked at again by staff who fall asleep during calls, The Times exposé reported.
Action Fraud was created by the City of London Police. Its call centre has been outsourced to barely trained £8.50-an-hour operators in Glasgow, possibly as young as 16. One fell asleep during calls, while another boasted of being drunk on shift.
The contractor is called Concentrix, a vast US company which made revenues of $1.2 billion in the last quarter, boasted of 37% profit margins and declared “it is in our DNA to manage costs”.
The result feels like policing at its very worst, done at its very cheapest.
Police chiefs told the Home Affairs select committee last year financial services fraud was so prevalent it was unreasonable to expect them to scratch the surface. Little surprise, then, that only 3% of complaints to Action Fraud result in charges.
It is typical of how financial crime is policed in the UK; low priority, with fewer than one in 200 victims seeing perpetrators convicted.
The select committee said banks, insurers and investment companies have much to lose in this crime wave and called for them to contribute more funding to the cash-strapped police’s efforts. Facebook, often used to market the scams, should pay more too. It’s hard to disagree.
Our financial services industry is the envy of the world. Let’s keep it that way with policing fit for purpose.
