Fraudulent holiday sickness claims will push up the price of holidays, warned Global Travel managing director Andy Stark at the group’s overseas conference this weekend. Stark said the rise in bogus claims was a big problem for the industry and will ultimately lead to higher prices for holidaymakers. “It will put the premiums up from […]
Category: Latest Fraud News
Thomas Cook adds voice to false holiday sickness claims
Thomas Cook has added its voice to growing concerns about the rise in false holiday sickness claims by Brits abroad. The travel giant said that ‘in common with the rest of the UK package travel industry’, it has seen an increase in illness related claims from UK consumers. “At a time when customer satisfaction levels […]
Industry must act on sickness claims
The recent upsurge in holiday sickness claims is “clearly fraud” and is putting the reputation of UK travel firms at risk. That is the view of Deloitte global leader for travel and aviation Graham Pickett, who urged industry leaders at the annual Barclays Travel Forum in London last week to do more to stamp out […]
Thomas Cook reports rise in holiday sickness claims
Thomas Cook revealed an increase in illness related claims from UK consumers in its interim half-year results and said it believes many to be “questionable”. The operator would not give figures but said the rise was in line with the rest of the UK package travel industry. Abta has talked of a 500% increase in […]
Take action on cyber security and new tech
Pritchard, lead partner for travel at the business advisory firm, played a hard-hitting video to the audience of around 500 delegates which showed how easy it can be to fall victim to a cyber attack as a business. Pritchard’s main piece of advice for avoiding such an attack was to regularly update anti-virus software. He […]
Trade urged to boost cyber security
Travel agents need to beef up cyber security in the wake of last weekend’s gobal ransomware attack. That was the message to members at the Advantage Conference, who were warned hackers can shatter medium and small businesses such as independent agents. NHS systems were hacked last week, while in February Abta was victim to a […]
Hajj fraud: Police warn Muslims over fake Mecca bookings
Police forces across the country are encouraging people to report Hajj fraud. Raising awareness this week, police forces say the Hajj fraud campaign is part of the ongoing efforts to protect Muslims who will be booking trips to Mecca over the coming months to perform Hajj between August 30 and September 4, 2017. Law enforcement […]
False holiday sickness claims
The travel trade is being urged to pull together to fight the rise of false holiday sickness claims. Speaking at the Advantage Conference in Provence this week, Deloitte lead partner Alistair Pritchard said it was a big issue for the industry. “We need to get together and make sure we appropriately lobby government,” he told […]
Reported travel fraud cases against consumers up 20%
Almost 6,000 unsuspecting UK travellers lost a total of £7.2 million from holiday booking fraud last year. The number of reported cases rose by almost 20% from 2015 from 4,910 to 5,826 with an average loss of £1,200 per person. The most common types of fraud involve the sale of airline tickets, booking accommodation online […]
Travel firms offered free tech to fight cybercrime
Free technology to fight cybercrime is to be offered to travel companies. The US-based Global Cyber Alliance, of which UK organisation Prevention of Fraud in Travel is a founding partner, will launch the initiative on May 30. It aims to reduce the risk of spam, phishing emails, ransomware and cyberattacks on travel and tourism companies. […]
Stay safe – the cyber criminals are watching
More than half (52%) of British businesses fell victim to cyber crime in 2016, at a cost of nearly £30 billion, according to a recent survey from Beaming. The specialist internet service provider also recorded a fivefold increase in the number of unique IP addresses used to launch attacks against UK businesses during 2016. More […]
Bogus holiday sickness claims – Portugal
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office has extended a warning over bogus holiday illness claims management companies to British holidaymakers in Portugal. The move follows Jet2holidays enlisting private detectives to help in the fight against false holiday sickness claims. The ongoing issue, which was highlighted on ITV News last night, has raised the prospect of Spanish […]
Jet2holidays hires private detectives
Jet2holidays is engaging the help of private detectives in its campaign against companies that “coax holidaymakers into making false sickness claims. The private detectives will be out in resorts, looking out for touts and claims management companies (CMCs) “attempting to lure holidaymakers into making false claims”. They will be acting on customer tip-offs too and […]
Cyber safety experts set for Travel Weekly summit
A special Travel Weekly summit will examine the growing threat from cyber criminals and what travel firms can do to protect themselves from attack. The half-day Cyber Security Summit, which will take place on June 22 at NatWest’s headquarters in Bishopsgate, London, will hear from experts in cybercrime and data security. Next year all firms […]
Risk of fraud for holidaymakers
A Which? investigation has proved just how easy it is for con artists to put fake accommodation listings on popular holiday-letting websites. We set up fake profiles on Airbnb and TripAdvisor’s Holiday Lettings, and successfully placed eight scam listings on each. In each case, it took us just minutes to create the scam listings and […]
Hotels shown to be susceptible to cybercrime
The hospitality industry continues to be a lucrative target for hackers and cybercriminals, the most recent example being a data breach of guests’ payment cards at nearly 1,200 InterContinental Hotels Group hotels in the U.S. The annual cost of payment-card fraud doubled worldwide between 2012 and 2015, to about $22 billion. It is expected to […]
Hackers launch Delta fake ticket receipt scam
Heimdal Security researchers spotted fraudsters sending phishing emails under the guise of blank Delta Airlines’ ticket confirmations. The victims receive an email purportedly from Delta stating that the user’s ticket order has been confirmed using their credit card, however the email does not contain any further details about the flight. However, it does contain links […]
Bogus travel agent jailed for two years
A bogus travel agent has been jailed for two years after conning families out of £130,000 by pretending she’d booked them holidays. Susan Lee, of Leaze Park, Okehampton, targeted friends, customers and strangers who came into her sweet and toy shop, The Emporium, in the Devon town. Exeter Crown Court heard she told them ‘a […]
British tourists’ fake poisoning scam
The Spanish tourism industry is up in arms at the booming popularity of a scam which has seen British holidaymakers apparently fake illness in order to claim hefty compensation packages from hotels. Industry sources have warned that increasing numbers of Britons are using the hoax, which involves complaining that a meal in the hotel where […]
IHG warns of second payment card data breach
InterContinental Hotels Group has issued a warning to customers over a second payment card data breach, which happened in late 2016. The latest breach occurred for transactions made between September 29, 2016 and December 29, 2016 and the company says there is no evidence any cards were compromised after this date. This breach affects more […]