West Sussex veterinary nurse sentenced for £13,000 pet insurance fraud

A court heard how Gemma Cole, 31, of Staples Barn, Henfield, was employed as a nurse at a vets surgery in West Sussex. She had insurance policies for her three cats and three dogs under Petplan and Pets at Home, subsidiaries of Allianz Insurance, and submitted fraudulent claims against them for more than four years.

Cole pleaded guilty at Crawley Magistrates Court to fraud by abuse of position following an investigation by the City of London Police’s Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department.

She was sentenced at Lewes Crown Court on August 29 to eight months imprisonment, suspended for 12 months, and ordered to complete a 20 day rehabilitation activity.

Detective Constable Richard Fox, from the City of London Police’s Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department, said: “Cole exploited her access to her employer’s systems for over four years to receive insurance payouts that she wasn’t entitled to.”

In May 2023, the head veterinary nurse at the practice contacted Allianz to report that Cole had been using Vet Envoy, the system it used to submit insurance claims, to make false and exaggerated claims for her pets.

Cole would often use other staff members’ accounts to add entries to her pets’ clinical records or prescribe medication, said the Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department.

Allianz compared the claims made by Cole against her pets’ records and found that she had claimed for £13,334 worth of medication and treatments that they had not received genuinely. The payouts from Allianz were made to the veterinary surgery and the surplus money was credited to Cole’s account and used to pay for treatments that were not covered under the policies.

Allianz referred the case to the Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department and officers executed a search warrant at Cole’s home and found a large quantity of pet medication that had been dispensed as a result of the fraudulent claims.

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Ben Fletcher, director of financial crime, Allianz Personal, said: "While the vast majority of our customers and claims are genuine, we work diligently to ensure that all claims are legitimate. In cases where they are not, we will carefully investigate and robustly defend where we suspect fraud.”