The new ‘failure to prevent fraud’ offence, which was introduced as part of the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023 comes into effect on the 01 September 2025.
To help NHS organisations to understand the impact of the new offence, we have produced supplementary guidance focusing on the failure to prevent fraud offence. This provides an overview of the offence and sets out the actions and next steps that NHS organisations might consider when preparing for implementation of the offence. This guidance will supplement the Home Office guidance on failure to prevent fraud and should be used alongside this.
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The Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023
This is a guide for our colleagues and partners in the counter fraud community highlighting information from the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023.
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The failure to prevent fraud offence
This section summarises the failure to prevent fraud offence and when it applies. The offence of failure to prevent fraud comes into effect on Mon 01 September 2025.
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Reasonable fraud prevention procedures
This section summarises what is meant by having reasonable fraud prevention procedures in place and how these link to existing NHS Requirements.
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Associates of a large organisation
A large organisation commits an offence when a person associated with it commits an offence; this section provides guidance on who or what an ‘associated’ person is.
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Statutory Guidance and references to NHSCFA
This section describes the statutory guidance created on the failure to prevent fraud offence and summarises the references to NHSCFA within this.
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Impact on NHS Bodies
This section describes how the failure to prevent fraud offence might impact NHS Bodies.
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Next steps – how to comply
This section sets out the actions and next steps that NHS organisations might consider when preparing for implementation of the offence.
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Similarities and differences to other failure to prevent offences
This section summarises how the failure to prevent fraud offence follows other similar ‘failure to prevent’ offences.
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FAQs
This section includes our answers to all of the questions that we have received on the failure to prevent fraud offence.