‘Crash for cash’ fraudsters are a menace in the cities and now they have started harassing motorists in rural areas as well.
Fraudsters fake accidents by making uncalled for emergency stops at busy roundabouts or slip roads, hereby forcing motorists to crash into them. Then a false claim is made to the innocent motorist’s insurance company and the claim includes fake injuries and made up passengers in an effort to get more money from the company.
Since they use rural areas, these fraudsters think that they will be a lot harder to detect. Performing these scams in rural means that the probability of serious injury or worse, death, to innocent drivers is increased, this is because the lack of traffic on rural roads allows the average speeds to be much higher than the average speeds in urban areas.
The head of Counter Fraud Operations at a popular insurance company, Paul Hubbard said, “Crash for cash scams pose a significant risk to public safety. As well as adding to the cost of insurance, they delay payouts on genuine claims as any reported accident at a known scam site has to undergo additional investigations.”
He added, “Our investigation systems mean that we can pinpoint areas of concern and the hot spots are just a small proportion of the data that we share with the rest of the insurance industry.
“We will not tolerate fraudsters and always push for the harshest penalties, as we have a duty to protect our customers. Every pound taken by a fraudster is a pound taken from honest motorists.”
According to the Insurance Fraud Bureau, the insurance industries exposure to fraudulent claims is the reason for the lack of cheap car insurance. This adds approximately £44 to the cost of annual car insurance.
