The Met Police has confirmed it is investigating a huge motor trade fraud that has seen ‘ghost cars’ and rogue dealers con firms out of millions of pounds.
The scam is reported to have cost the car finance industry more than £10m after criminals managed to submit fake finance proposals via a network of car dealers.
Brokers say it is the ‘largest fraud’ ever to have hit the car finance industry with several institutions said to have lost millions of pounds.
The scam has been investigated by the National Vehicle Crime Intelligence Service which has passed a file to the Met Police for further investigation.
The Met Police said: ‘We can confirm that this remains an active investigation and enquiries are ongoing.’
The sophisticated fraud was discovered at the end of last year after a rogue dealer was found to have submitted car finance applications on a criminal gang’s behalf.
It was uncovered by a network of car finance brokers when they were contacted by lenders demanding money back for fake finance deals.
Those banks had been alerted to the industrial-scale fraud by customers who claimed car finance payments had been taken out of their bank accounts for cars ‘they had never received’.
The car finance brokers – the middle men organising the deals on behalf of the dealers and the lenders – have been the hardest hit by this scam as they indemnify the banks for the sums they loan.
A number of dealers were targeted by the criminals in the South East and North West of England and, when confronted by the brokers, they simply ceased trading.
Rob Woollen, chief operating officer of DSG, a car finance broker hit for a seven-figure sum, said: ‘It’s unlikely we’ll ever see the money again as the dealers have simply liquidated their businesses.
‘This is serious organised crime. Highly sophisticated, well-resourced. Not isolated individuals.’
Woollen was interviewed by Car Dealer for a special one-off podcast – Ghost Car Fraud: A £10m Scam – which tells the story in full. You can find it on YouTube (above), on Spotify (below), as well as Apple Podcasts and other platforms.
The complicated scam saw criminal gangs approach a number of dealers across the UK pretending to be motor traders and asking them to submit finance applications on their behalf.
The criminals offered the dealers the chance to keep the commission from the finance deals if they sent the balance for the cars to them.
However, the dealers submitting the finance proposals never met the customer, nor saw the car they were proposing.
Brokers told Car Dealer they believe that most of the consumers involved were also complicit in the scam and were getting paid for their services. However, they also believe some customers may have been conned by phishing exercises that stole their personal details to allow the con to take place.
Woollen said: ‘It’s hard to believe someone pays finance for three months without receiving a car and does nothing.
‘In one case, we even saw the vehicle at the customer’s property, yet they later claimed they never received it.’
The brokers believe consumers were complicit because all of the customers passed biometric checks put in place to check people’s identity before lending money. These can involve passport and driving licence checks and using a selfie and technology to match them up.
The complicit customers were likely being paid for their services by the fraudsters. Brokers believe the scammers would pay them a fee and send them money to pay a few monthly payments on the finance to delay the scam unravelling.
They would eventually call the finance company and ask about the payments and claim never to have seen the car. This delaying tactic would allow the scammers to submit multiple finance applications via one rogue dealer before the crime is uncovered.
The finance company gave them their money back and chased the broker who, in turn, would chase the dealer – when it all unraveled the dealers simply declare themselves bankrupt, leaving the broker to pay up.
With the average finance pay-outs of around £30,000 a time, it didn’t take many fake applications for the criminals to cash in huge sums of money.
Dan Horner, managing director of Octane Finance, added: ‘These customers are genuine customers. They are real people – they’re able to bypass all of our biometrics and other verifications because they are genuine, real people.’
He said he’s also worried this scam will continue.
‘At the minute, there’s no stopping it,’ he added.
‘If a dealer has had enough after 15 or 20 years, or even just a year in the business, and thinks they can get out of it for a quick buck, there’s nothing stopping them.’
Listen to the story in full in our special podcast episode – Ghost Car Fraud: A £10m Scam – out now on your favourite podcast platform.