Whilst reported fraud for the whole of last year reached a huge £1.2 billion, in only the first six months of 2009 that figure has almost been met, with figures showing that so far this year, fraud has cost the UK a shocking £960 million.

The total number of fraud cases has also leapt by a third and experts from the firm have said that “we are a long way from bottom” and predicted that the total fraud figures will treble over the course of the economic downturn.

Simon Bevan, head of the fraud services team at BDO Stoy Hayward, said: “There is a whole wave of commercial lending fraud that is yet to crash around the ears of UK and overseas banks and it is no surprise to see that reported mortgage fraud has rocketed or that management ‘cooking the books’ has risen by nearly 50 per cent.”

Stating that fraud levels will increase to £3 billion per annum, Mr Bevan added that the true figure was much greater as 95% of all fraud is not publicly reported to the authority figures and therefore cannot be included in the above figures.

“Over the past four years we have investigated a significant number of high value frauds yet only one of those has been through the criminal courts in the UK.” Mr Bevan said. “We know from experience that banks, property companies, housing associations etc that are hit by property frauds are very unlikely to go to the criminal courts.”

The group have stated that mortgage fraud has hit £97 million so far this year, due to the over valuation of property prices, which has been exposed in the recession.