Taxi Driver Online

Wonder if we'll be seeing more prosecutions about this in the coming years

If only I'd known how easy it was - I'd have left the country as well

But wouldn't be back


Taxi driver ripped off pandemic loan scheme for £100K 'with absurd ease'

https://www.devonlive.com/news/devon-ne ... an-9981827

Exeter court told the national emergency fund was "absurdly easy" to cheat

A taxi driver has been jailed for ripping off the taxpayer and pocketing £100,000 from the pandemic Bounce Back loan scheme. Murat Dogantekin took advantage of the "absurd ease" with which the loans were available in order to make a gain for himself, a court heard.

He made two fraudulent applications just a few weeks after the national health emergency was declared. Some of the money he obtained was sent to Turkey.

He then declared himself bankrupt and refused to cooperate with the official receiver. The 50-year-old, of Mulligan Close in Exeter has been jailed for two years and seven months at Exeter Crown Court.

The judge told him: "Your utter dishonesty is patent. It seems clear to me you saw the chance to enrich yourself and probably others close to you and your fraudulent behaviour had little to do with the mitigating effects of the pandemic on your income."

Prosecutor Emily Cook said Dogantekin applied for and obtained a Bounce Back loan of £50,000 in May 2020 - just six weeks after lockdown started. He had been working as a self-employed taxi driver and falsely claimed his turnover was £200,000 in order to get the maximum loan amount.

The money was withdrawn within a few days and paid into an off-shore account in his name. Just over a month later he made and obtained a second loan for £50,000. He once again grossly inflated his turnover in order to secure the loan, said the prosecutor.

Dogantekin sent more than £30,000 to an account in a family name in Turkey. He was careful to make withdrawals of less than £10,000 each time in order not to attract attention.

He declared himself bankrupt in November of 2021 but stopped complying with process, attending meetings or replying to letters.

The defendant, a father-of-two with no previous convictions, admitted two frauds to make a gain for himself through the Bounce Back loan scheme. He also pleaded guilty to being a bankrupt and not providing the official receiver with records and information.

William Parkhill, defending, said he wanted to use the money to start a new business in Tukey due to the favourable currency exchange rate. Before the pandemic he was hard working and is now ashamed of what he did.

He said Dogantekin had only spent 25 minutes on his laptop making the applications due to the ease the money was available. He asked the judge to consider not sending the defendant straight to jail.

Judge David Evans said the scheme may have been "ill-thought out" and vulnerable but the country was facing a crisis. He added: "You applied for and obtained by outright lies to the maximum levels of two £50,000 Bounce Back loans by taking advantage of the absurd ease these loans were available. Because of the structure of the loans the losers were not the banks but taxpayers."

He said Dogantekin, who had an interpreter in court, had no difficulty filling in the application forms in English. He said prison was the only punishment. Dogantekin will serve 40 per cent of the sentence in jail before being released on licence.

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IDFIMH

Many many more like it . He will do less than a year in prison for £100,000 fraud . I would be tempted.

A bit more detail in the official press release from HMG's Insolvency Service...but a fair bit of repetition if you've read the press report above.

But he called himself Ola Taxis for the claim for the false business

Maybe he was one of those filling in the TaxiPoint survey - fictitious information about Ola


Devon taxi driver jailed after overstating annual income by more than £350,000 to fraudulently secure two Covid loans

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/devo ... ovid-loans

Bounce Back Loan fraudster transferred the funds to an offshore bank account and a family member

• Taxi driver Murat Dogantekin secured two £50,000 Bounce Back Loans in 2020 which he was not entitled to

• Dogantekin overstated his turnover by hundreds of thousands of pounds, fraudulently applied for two loans when businesses were only allowed one, used the funds for personal expenses and failed to make any repayments

• The 50-year-old was jailed for two years and seven months

A Devon taxi driver who fraudulently claimed two maximum-value Covid loans by overstating his annual turnover by more than £350,000 has been jailed.

Murat Dogantekin secured the Bounce Back Loans worth a combined £100,000 from two separate banks just months into the pandemic, when he was only actually entitled to just over £4,000 under the scheme.

He then transferred the funds to a close family member and offshore bank account.

The 50-year-old, of Mulligan Drive, Exeter, was sentenced to two years and seven months in prison when he appeared at Exeter Crown Court on Thursday 27 February.

Mark Stephens, Chief Investigator at the Insolvency Service, said:

"Bounce Back Loans were created to support small and medium-sized businesses through the pandemic. They were not designed to be accessed by fraudsters and used as additional personal income paid for at the expense of taxpayers.

"Murat Dogantekin completely disregarded almost all the rules of the scheme. He significantly overstated his turnover, subsequently receiving far more support than he should have done. He fraudulently obtained two loans when businesses were only entitled to a single loan.

"To make matters worse, Dogantekin failed to use the money for the benefit of his business, concealing the true nature of his bank transactions with false references. He also did not pay a single penny back before he was declared bankrupt and failed to engage with our investigations.

"Such a blatant and deliberate misuse of public funds will not be tolerated by the Insolvency Service and we will continue to take action against those who stole from the taxpayer during a national emergency.

Dogantekin secured two Bounce Back Loans worth £50,000 each from separate banks in May and June 2020.

In his applications, Dogantekin stated that his annual turnover was £200,000 and £205,000 for two separate self-employed taxi businesses, both in his own name, although he said the second traded as Ola Taxis.

He provided no evidence to support these claims and Insolvency Service investigators discovered that the second business was actually named after one of his clients. This was done in an attempt to distinguish it from his first business and make it appear that he was eligible for a second loan when he was not.

Dogantekin had declared earnings of just £16,500 for the tax year ending in April 2020, meaning he overstated his turnover by £388,500 in the combined applications.

Had he been honest about his income, he may have been entitled to one loan of just £4,125.

His dishonesty meant he received an additional £95,875 he did not deserve.

Within four days of receiving the first loan, Dogantekin transferred £49,500 of the £50,000 to a separate bank account. The transactions were marked as “shop purchase”.

The following day, £48,000 of that money was moved to an offshore bank account.

Dogantekin’s second loan remained in his business account for more than a month before the funds were paid out to a family member and his own personal account within a six-day period.

No repayments to the loans were made before Dogantekin was declared bankrupt in November 2021.

Dogantekin was interviewed by the Official Receiver Services at the Insolvency Service later that month and provided some limited documentation.

He then ignored 11 attempts to contact him and secure specific records during a six-month period.

Dogantekin also failed to attend an interview under caution.

The Insolvency Service is seeking to recover the fraudulently obtained funds under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002.

Further information

• Murat Dogantekin is of Mulligan Drive, Exeter. His date of birth is 20 May 1974

• Sentenced for: Fraud by false representation, contrary to section 2 of the Fraud Act 2006 and concealment of books and papers, contrary to section 355 of the Insolvency Act 1986

• Read more about the Bounce Back Loan Scheme and the action the Insolvency Service can take if it finds misconduct 

• Further information about the work of the Insolvency Service, and how to complain about financial misconduct.

and why will I not be surprised if they recover a grand total of ZERO.

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

If it's clear he hasn't any assets then they won't spend much time on him, however the fact that they have started might mean the fella has property, and that they will take back.

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IDFIMH

From a taxpayers point of view it would be nice but I'm sure if he has anything it will all have been bought by relatives (using his illegal money).

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Pity it isn't as easy to bring Michelle Mone to court, she had £27m if I remember correctly.