What fraud are you taking about? Did you actually read the original post? No fraud was committed; the sum of her bank accounts was well under the threshold for affecting any benefits so where was the fraud? Where did I ask why the fraud failed? There was no fraud Like I said, some posters should stick to reading the Daily Mail

Why am I getting grief here; at no stage did I say or imply that I planned to deceive/withhold financial information from anyone. If I was to claim benefits (heaven forbid I would ever have to since the level of JSA wouldn't support a hamster) I would be happy to declare any cash savings I had; I simply resent the fact that private organisations can access your bank details; at what point did I say I had £100,000 thousand pounds in the bank and planned to take it all out so that I could commit fraud? Looks like some of the posters here should stick to reading the Daily Mail

Thanks to all for the feedback; seems unless you're one of the elite who can store your savings tax free offshore, you have to be prepared to have your private finances thoroughly investigated by private companies when you fall on hard times and require the state to support you. What a sad state of affairs. Since I hate all banks anyway, I think i'll take all my savings out and take my chances with house thieves; in the current economic climate, you never know when you may end up requiring to claim benefits of some description!

I hate to sound cynical, but if I was under threat of losing my job now, the first thing i would do was empty my bank account and store the money under the mattress!

Hi id6052 Thanks for response but she only told them about one bank account Hi sadone I can't accept that they can simply request a credit check and bingo! obtain the balance and details of every account; since I have no knowledge of credit checks, I simply assumed they only existed to record payment defaults and the like from finance companies!

Cheers sadone

Thanks to everyone for the feedback: have just discovered a link which would indeed suggest almost draconian powers to investigate JSA/council tax rebate claims: haven't done 10 posts yet so not allowed to post link but its dwp.gov.uk/docs/cop-ssfa.pdf

maroondevo52, backofbeyond and caledfwlch thanks for your responses; while I have no objection to public bodies taking all reasonable steps to prevent fraud, I just cannot understand what possible legal mechanism could be employed to allow any organisation to access details in a bank account with the only information available being a name and address and with no prior knowledge of Bank, branch, sort code etc; surely, even checking credit files won't flag up any useful info?

Hi maroondevo52, No, both accounts were with totally different banks, one was RBS and the other ING

Hi jojopo000 Thanks for your response; I still can't believe they can legally access a bank account for which they have been given absolutely no details of in terms of bank, account number, sort code etc. Surely they can't ask every bank if a specific person holds an account with them However, I recently heard from one source who claimed that, if you give them details of one bank account, they can search 10 years back into this account and look for payments to/from another account(s); they can then access the other account(s) this way. Not sure if this is the case for my friend, I'll need to ask her

Hi Nystagmite Thanks for quick response; no, as far as she led me to believe she only handed over a recent 3-month statement of one of her bank accounts, as requested, and give no authorisation for any further access

Hi there My first post so please forgive me if this subject has already been covered Does anyone know whether JCP and/or local councils have the right to access all your bank account when you try to claim JSA and/or council tax rebates? A friend of mine claims she supplied them with a statement from one of her bank accounts and they came back to her with an alternative figure which matched her combined savings from her 2 bank accounts (the total figure was under the threshold anyway, so she was entitled to full JSA and council tax rebate anyway, but was stunned that they could access her 2nd bank account)