UK small business bounce back loan scheme at “very high” fraud risk, NAO confirms

A UK government-backed loan scheme to help small businessesstruggling due to Covid-19 was launched in such a hurry, on 4 May [2020], thatit was not until 2 June, almost a month later, that a methodology to preventduplicate applications was implemented, according to the National Audit Office.[1] In the interim, up to 2.3% of approved applications are estimated to havebeen duplicates.