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Suddenly applying the brakes for no apparent reason is a common way crash for cash criminals may dupe you into hitting them from behind.
Sometimes, they operate in teams to cause an accident with one driving unpredictably ahead of their partner in crime. If their unexpected braking causes you to hit them, they’ll say it wasn’t their fault and blame the car in front, who have since made a clean getaway being seemingly unconnected.
Sometimes these fraudsters may not even wait for you to hit them at all. There have been cases reported when they simply simulate a crash-like noise, for example by throwing something at your vehicle and then intimidating you into handing over cash for ‘hitting’ their wing mirror.
when there wasn’t even a crash at all. Despite there never having been an accident, scammers conjure one out of thin air, making up a believable story so they can make a fraudulent claim against their car insurance.
Looking at our claims data, we saw that four in ten of these accidents happen during the school run and rush hour, between 3-7pm. Lunchtime also seems to be a prime time for fraudsters, with 27% of collisions happening between 11am-2pm.
In terms of which day of the week you may statistically be more likely to experience a crash for cash attempt, we saw 27% of incidents occurring on a Wednesday.
According to LV= claims data, London bears the brunt of the problem with over half of incidents taking place in Greater London. South London accounts for 42% of the exposure and North London accounts for 26%. Croydon, in South London is named as an insurance fraud hotspot alongside Enfield in North London, as well as certain locations in Southwest London.
Top 15 crash for cash UK hotspots based on cases received by LV= in 2023:
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| 1. | Central London | |
| 2. | Birmingham | |
| 3. | Manchester | |
| 4. | Bristol | |
| 5. | Bradford | |
| 6. | Glasgow | |
| 7. | Sutton |
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| 8. | Enfield | |
| 9. | Leeds | |
| 10. | Slough | |
| 11. | Rochdale | |
| 12. | Coventry | |
| 13. | Croydon | |
| 14. | Ross-on-Wye | |
| 15. | Shrewsbury |
Drive extra carefully. Always double-check to make sure it’s safe to pull out, especially at junctions. Crash for cash scammers might flash you to let you in only to accelerate and crash into you.
Trust your instincts. Anything that makes you question their behaviour could be a signal you’re dealing with a con artist. For example, do they conveniently have all their details to hand, ready to make the exchange in no time, as if they were expecting an accident?
A genuine crash, including minor incidents, often leave people feeling a little shaken, but a fraudster carrying out a crash for cash scam may not appear quite so affected. In fact, they may come across as very confident and, in some cases, fairly relaxed about the whole thing.
The flipside to this scenario is that some scammers pretend to have an injury caused by the ‘accident’ or act as if what happened was a lot worse than it really was.
It’s important not to let scammers know if you think you’re on to them.
The best thing you can do is stay calm, act natural and try to get all the information you normally would after a genuine accident. Record as much evidence as possible, including:
Find witnesses and get their version of events in writing as well as their name and phone number. Look to see if there’s any CCTV available, including dash cams or doorbell cameras that may have footage of the accident.
