An international multi-disciplinary approach to combatting fraud in insolvency by Carmel King & Willem van Nielen

An international multidisciplinary approach to combatting fraud in insolvency is a practical necessity. Where cases are multi-jurisdictional, it is essential to use innovative approaches with input across several disciplines. The INSOL Europe Anti-Fraud Forum (“AFF”) was established with this as one of its aims. This working group currently has 69 members spanning 22 jurisdictions, all of whom specialise in using insolvency processes to assist with the tracing and recovery of assets.

To further the multidisciplinary approach, the AFF has combined forces with the International Expert Centre for Bankruptcy Fraud (“IBF”). In December 2019 an INSOL Europe and IBF co-labelled conference on International Bankruptcy Fraud will be held in Amsterdam. The IBF aims to create an international community of professionals who deal with insolvency fraud, such as bankruptcy trustees, forensic accountants, criminal defense lawyers, law enforcement officers, (supervisory) judges, lawyers from the Ministry of Justice, representatives of the tax authority and the police departments. The way these professionals will work together to combat fraud in insolvency will differ by country. In this article we aim to show some of these differences from a Dutch and UK perspective.