Checks could have prevented £550,000 payroll fraud

An employee at a Scottish agricultural firm has admitted stealing £550,000 after submitting false payroll records for workers who did not exist.

Viktorija Lukjanova, who worked for East Lothian Produce, a family-owned vegetable processing, packing and marketing business, was responsible for managing agency workers and processing the timesheets used to authorise their pay, including for a large number of foreign workers.

Over a three-year period, she created fake worker records and submitted forged timesheets and invoices, directing payments into her own bank account.

The fictitious workers were registered under the names of two of Lukjanova’s family members.

The fraud was identified when a manager recognised two of the names, prompting an internal investigation.

After initially denying wrongdoing, claiming the surnames were common in Latvia, her country of origin, Lukjanova later admitted she had used the false records to conceal the employment of workers who lacked the legal documentation to work in the UK.

The company dismissed her and then referred the matter to the police in February 2024.

In January 2026, Lukjanova pleaded guilty to fraud offences committed between January 2021 and February 2024. She is currently on bail while a social work report is prepared ahead of sentencing.

According to the Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals, payroll fraud accounted for around 10 per cent of UK fraud cases in 2024, affecting businesses of all sizes.

Roger Isaacs, National Technical Director of NIFA, comments, “Payroll fraud often occurs where one individual has control over worker onboarding, time recording and payment approvals. When those duties are not properly separated or independently reviewed, it becomes far easier to manipulate records without detection.

“The employment of so-called ghost employees (who do not really exist) can be hard to spot and sadly, even when frauds such as this are discovered, the victims seldom recover the funds that have been misappropriated.

“The best hope of a recovery is by means of a Compensation Order made under the Proceeds of Crime Act but all too often perpetrators have spent all they have stolen and very little remains to be recovered for victims.”

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