EMERGING

EMERGING MARKETS:
A Review of Business and Legal Issues
fighting this type of crime. Therefore, it will be necessary to rely on the experience of
countries with longer insurance traditions, as they have recognised the fraudulent obtaining of
undue compensation as a grave problem and have systematically developed forms and
methods of disclosing insurance fraud.
At present, developing a far-reaching strategy consisting of setting and defining tasks
related to the prevention and detection of insurance crime is of prime importance. However,
one may create certain general guidelines for insurance companies and other market
protection bodies, which do not require changes in legislation and which will be of help in
combating insurance crime. In my view, one should establish a centre that would coordinate
activities of insurance companies and that would deal with the problem in a professional
manner and, further, in all such companies one should create units implementing preventive
measures and detecting fraud.
Insurance companies are businesses and not public entities and as such they are not
obliged by law to prosecute economic crimes. Yet, they have the greatest potential to expose
such crimes.
I believe that the most important factor that significantly affects the phenomenon
under analysis is the atmosphere of social disapproval. Unfortunately, there is no research
data and following my unreliable intuition only, I get the impression that some types of
insurance crime are not socially stigmatised, and they are not even regarded as contemptible.
Some representatives of public opinion believe that obtaining an unduly high or even an
undue compensation payment is tantamount to “resourcefulness” rather than a criminal
offence. Those who adopt this view seem not to understand that this “resourcefulness”
translates also into higher insurance premiums that they have to pay.
We must underline the enormous role of signs indicating the possibility of the
commitment of a crime in the process of detecting insurance crimes. Knowing the signs
enables, from the outset, to properly classify information reported in an insurance claim, with
a view to checking whether the procedure is not aimed at a fraudulent procurement of
compensation or any other type of benefit.
Page 127 Volume 1, April 2009