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Written question asked by James Brokenshire (Conservative) on Tuesday, 22 July 2008, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Monday, 6 October 2008. It was answered by Lord Coaker (Labour) on Tuesday, 7 October 2008 on behalf of the Home Office.

Credit Cards: Fraud

Question
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many offences of fraud relating to credit cards have been notified by banks and other financial institutions to the police in each police force area since April 2007.
Answer

In 2007-08, there were 23,344 cases of fraud by false representation that involved a cheque, plastic card or online bank account recorded by police (this includes some instances of the similar offence of cheque and credit card fraud committed under old legislation in place before 15 January 2007).These offences could have either been referred direct by a financial institution, reported by an account holder or merchant who was not refunded monies by their financial institution or dealt with as a direct call for service to the police where a suspect was believed to be committing a crime at the time. These offences will in some instances relate to online fraud, but there is no specific category of recorded crime to separately identify these. In addition, we do not separately identify fraud offences relating to credit cards that have been notified to police by banks or financial institutions.Statistics giving the number of fraud offences relating to cheque, plastic card and online bank accounts recorded by each police force area since April 2007 are shown in the following table.

Fraud by false representation: cheque, plastic card and online bank accounts recorded by each police force in England and Wales from 2007-08
Force name Number of fraud offences
Avon and Somerset 547
Bedfordshire 394
British Transport Police 315
Cambridgeshire 430
Cheshire 276
Cleveland 196
Cumbria 14
Derbyshire 361
Devon and Cornwall 603
Dorset 139
Durham 187
Dyfed-Powys 69
Essex 592
Gloucestershire 161
Greater Manchester 316
Gwent 107
Hampshire 824
Hertfordshire 448
Humberside 284
Kent 537
Lancashire 317
Leicestershire 512
Lincolnshire 145
London, City of 107
Merseyside 308
Metropolitan Police 7330
Norfolk 184
Northamptonshire 325
Northumbria 18
North Wales 104
North Yorkshire 220
Nottinghamshire 224
South Wales 513
South Yorkshire 373
Staffordshire 368
Suffolk 279
Surrey 730
Sussex 472
Thames Valley 945
Warwickshire 262
West Mercia 423
West Midlands 765
West Yorkshire 911
Wiltshire 709
England and Wales 23,344

Secondary information

Type
Written question
Reference
222651; 480 c565-6W
Session
2007-08
Subjects
Credit cards Fraud
Link
View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk