Car leasing firms should check their customers are authentic, says the City of London Police’s National Fraud Intelligence Bureau. The NFIB warns that overseas crime groups are targeting UK-based car leasing companies to fraudulently obtain high performance motor vehicles.
The NFIB has ascertained that high-end quality motor vehicles are rented from legitimate car leasing companies using fraudulent identification. The criminals have no intention of returning the motor vehicles. The vehicles are shipped abroad where the index plates are changed and bodywork re-painted. Leasing the vehicle affords the criminal group time to move the motor vehicle out of the UK without raising suspicion.
A proportion of the vehicles are taken out of the UK to places such as Cyprus, Spain and Poland. According to police, most of the vehicles end up in the hands of organised crime groups who are involved with boiler rooms and high-end money laundering in the UK.
For more on vehicle crime, see the August 2016 print issue of Professional Security magazine.
