Fraud and Who Should Pay

UK Finance recently published its Annual Fraud Report ¹. It describes in detail what is happening and changes in fraud. Although it does not say how those costs are then passed on to the consumer, it will undoubtedly be the consumer who ultimately pays. Understanding fraud is, therefore, important.

There are different models for deciding who compensates the defrauded, and here we cover and compare the UK with Singapore.

The scale of digital payment fraud in the UK

The UK Finance report details the scale, and nature, of fraud in the UK. Fraud is not a ‘victimless’ crime. It is also the most common crime in the UK, costing £1.17 billion in 2024. This is broadly unchanged from 2023. However, there were 3.31 million confirmed cases, an increase of 12% compared to 2023. In addition, £1.45 billion of unauthorised fraud was prevented by the industry, up 16% from 2023 and equivalent to 67p in every £1 attempted.