Birmingham court orders repayment in Covid support fraud case

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Birmingham Covid fraud repayment

Highlights

Birmingham Crown Court ordered Zeeshan Ashraf to repay £307,690 after defrauding Covid support schemes, with three months to fulfill the order.
Ashraf fraudulently obtained £268,102 between April 2020 and April 2021 via the Eat Out to Help Out, Bounce Back Loan, and Covid Job Retention schemes.
Authorities found Ashraf used false turnover claims and bogus applications to secure multiple £50,000 Bounce Back Loans and £91,174 via unauthorised Covid Job Retention Scheme claims.

Confiscation order follows earlier conviction

As reported by GOV.UK, Birmingham Crown Court has ordered Zeeshan Ashraf to repay £307,690 after he fraudulently claimed money through the Eat Out to Help Out Scheme, the Bounce Back Loan Scheme and the Covid Job Retention Scheme.

Ashraf, 46, was jailed for three years and eight months by the same court in February 2025 after obtaining £268,102 between April 2020 and April 2021 and attempting to claim a further £52,733. He has been given three months to satisfy the confiscation order issued on Tuesday 13 October.

If he fails to pay, he could face an additional two-and-a-half years in prison while still remaining liable for the full amount. Alexander Grierson, head of asset recovery at the Insolvency Service, said the case shows that a conviction and prison sentence do not necessarily end enforcement action against fraudsters.

Fraud spanned three support schemes

Ashraf used his accountancy firm, A-Z Certified Accountants Limited, to obtain three separate £50,000 Bounce Back Loans from different banks in 2020, despite businesses being entitled to only one loan. He falsely stated that the company's turnover was between £215,000 and £244,000 when it was actually £8,000, enabling him to secure the maximum amount on each application.

Authorities said the £150,000 taken through those loans was spent on lifestyle purposes, property investments and repayment of personal loans rather than business support. He also received £91,174 through the Covid Job Retention Scheme by making multiple false or unauthorised applications to HM Revenue and Customs on behalf of business clients, while further claims for £38,082 failed.

Ashraf separately obtained £26,928 through the Eat Out to Help Out Scheme by submitting claims for hospitality businesses that either did not exist or were not operating in the restaurant trade, and he unsuccessfully sought another £14,651. The confiscation order includes the value of the money obtained plus an uplift reflecting changes in the value of money since 2020, although the total was reduced by about £33,000 already repaid on the Bounce Back Loans.

The original criminal investigation was carried out by HM Revenue and Customs and investigators now part of the Insolvency Service. Confiscation proceedings were handled jointly by HM Revenue and Customs and the Insolvency Service, while the Crown Prosecution Service prosecuted the case.

In our earlier article, we covered a Court of Appeal ruling in Malaysia that a commission-partner lawyer at a law firm could be treated as a partner under the Partnership Act 1961 and held personally liable for a firm-related debt. The decision overturned lower-court findings and highlighted how professional titles and partnership structures can carry significant financial responsibility in disputes over misdirected or unpaid client funds.

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