HMRC rejects £1m suspicious invoices every day
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) has rejected over £1 billion worth of suspicious invoices in the past three years, as it intensifies efforts to combat fraud and errors within the UK tax system, according to official figures.
The findings, obtained via a Freedom of Information (FOI) request by Basware revealed that HMRC has rejected a total of 29,360 invoices valued at £1,046,036,133.72 over the last three years.
Of this figure, 12,000 were PDF invoices, with a further 17,360 were logged via the department’s eTrading procurement system.
The rejected invoices fall into a variety of categories included supplier errors, rejected and unpaid, rejected and subsequently paid and rejected due to goods or services not being received.
Additionally, HMRC revealed that it spent £814,143,904 over three years employing an average of 4,800 staff annually in its Customer Compliance Group (CCG) – responsible for the department’s enforcement and compliance activities.
HMRC’s response stated: “CCG staff work on risk assessment, compliance activity and corporate functions, to address a range of taxpayer behaviours, from light touch interventions that correct taxpayer error to more complex cases that can tackle all behaviours, including evasion and fraud.
CCG’s Fraud Investigation Service (FIS) is responsible for HMRC’s civil and criminal investigations into the most serious fraud and wrongdoing.”
Jason Kurtz, CEO of Basware, commented, “Invoice errors and fraud is one of the biggest threats facing large enterprises, including governments. Criminals are producing increasingly realistic fake documents, designed to divert legitimate payments into rogue bank accounts.
Suspicious and inaccurate invoices also drain resources of finance teams, with staff attempting to manually verify crucial documents. Tackling this problem is no easy task, but harnessing the power of AI to verify payment details and automate processing is key to reducing workloads and saving money.”
