Corporate criminal liability for economic crimes – our briefing on the new failure to prevent fraud offence

Our corporate crime team has published a briefing on the offence of failure to prevent fraud.

The ECCTA introduced a new offence of failure to prevent fraud (FTP Fraud Offence), which will come into effect on 1 September 2025. The new, strict liability offence will be committed by an in-scope organisation if an associate (which includes employees, agents and subsidiaries) commits a specified fraud offence, such as false accounting, with the intention of benefiting the organisation or any of its customers. The company will have a defence if it had reasonable fraud prevention procedures in place.

Organisations now have just over seven months to digest the elements of the offence and ‘reasonable procedures’ and implement any required changes.

The Home Office has published guidance on the FTP Fraud Offence, which provides insight into what will be expected of organisations in terms of fraud prevention procedures. However, the guidance is not prescriptive so careful thought and proper engagement will be required to ensure appropriate and risk-based measures are put in place.

Our briefing provides an overview of the key elements of the FTP Fraud Offence and what organisations should be doing now to ensure they are prepared before the September 2025 implementation date.