A Standard Life employee has been imprisoned after he admitted embezzling £28,000 from the company. The employee began moving commission due to be paid to financial advisers into a personal account after joining the commission department in 1996. In December 2004, it became noticeable that a high number of small transactions had been made for as little as £200, which sparked an investigation.
Standard Life have made clear that no clients or customers have been affected by this, only the company themselves. They have since changed procedures to make sure that this does not happen again.
Our view
Many finance houses particularly banks experience some form of staff crime. It is just not reported that often. At least Standard Life have publicly dealt with this unlike many.