While the government had sought to design coronavirus support schemes to limit the likelihood of mistakes and fraud occurring, the scale of the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) has meant that the error and fraud rate has been making headlines. Most of these headlines have focused on ‘ghost’ employees or where employers had required furloughed staff to continue to work.

However, it is becoming apparent that an increasing number of employers, who have otherwise applied the scheme correctly, have then misused some of the CJRS funds advanced.