Renfrewshire Council

The impact of  benefit fraud

Each pound lost to fraud represents a loss to the public purse and reduces the ability of local government bodies to provide services to people who need them. Fraud is never a victimless crime.

The Audit Commission's 2014 report 'Protecting the Public Purse' stated that: The scale of fraud against local government is large, but difficult to quantify with precision.

In 2013, the National Fraud Authority estimated that fraud cost local government £2.1 billion, but this is probably an underestimate.

Our aim is to adopt a corporate approach to fighting fraud, thereby protecting the public purse from fraud.

What fraud is

Some examples of fraud include people who:

• work, but don't declare this when they submit their claim/application.
• claim or apply as a single person, but actually live with someone else
• claim or apply from an address, but do not live there
• do not declare when someone moves into the property (ie, children/family/friends etc).
• do not tell us the full amount of income, savings or capital they have when they make a claim/application or after their circumstances change.
• for any reason do not have the right to claim
• provide false information in order to achieve financial or personal gain
• misuse council property, such as Blue Badges
• sub let council properties.

Report benefit fraud

You can report suspected benefit fraud to us online.

The more information you can give us, the more successful our investigations will be.

Any information you give will be treated in the strictest confidence. You don't even need to tell us your name.

You can also report suspected fraud for Social Security Scotland benefits on the mygov.scot website

For any other benefits, visit the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) website.