You’re more likely to fall victim to a ‘crash for cash’ scam in Birmingham than anywhere else in the UK.

The Midlands city received the unwanted title of being Britain’s crash for cash capital after a list of the top 30 postcodes for the crime featured ten Birmingham areas. Washwood Heath, Aston and Small Heath were the three worst postcodes for the crime in the UK.

Compiled by the Insurance Fraud Bureau (IFB), the table placed Bradford second, followed by Manchester and London.

Aside from Birmingham and London, 2017’s top crash for cash locations were all in the north of England, with Oldham, Liverpool and Bolton placing fifth, sixth and seventh respectively, followed by Sheffield and Wakefield.

Crash for cash fraudsters set up collisions with other road users with the aim of profiting from the resulting insurance claims and they’re rife throughout the UK, with insurance provider Aviva noting 3,000 such claims in 2016 alone.

Ben Fletcher, the director of the IFB, a not-for-profit organisation set up to detect fraud, couldn’t explain precisely why Birmingham featured so heavily in the list.

“Obviously, this is a nationwide problem and we have investigations that range from Kent to the North East, but large urban areas tend to be the focal points for these kind of crimes,” he added.

In the past 12 months, 55,573 personal injury claims were linked to scams in the UK, the IFB says, something which costs the insurance industry £340m a year.

You can read the IFB’s full Crash for Cash report here.

There are some tell-tale signs that you may have been caught up in a crash for cash scam, for example if the other driver is playing up their injuries, like if they’re rubbing their neck as soon as they get out of the car. Having insurance details written down already is another big clue.

Ben Robb, brand manager at The Fuelcard People, comments: “Crash for cash continues to be a significant problem. There are not victimless crimes, they’re highly dangerous and force up insurance premiums for other drivers unnecessarily by hundreds of pounds a year.”