Jersey Water has warned customers about scammers making unsolicited phone calls offering bogus water insurance, in the latest case of insurance fraud to hit the island as Jersey insurance regulators grapple with a surge in financial crime.
The utility company said callers were telling customers they needed to renew "water insurance" policies, while requesting payments or personal information. Jersey Water confirmed it does not offer water insurance and would not contact customers to request payment or personal details for such a purpose.
"If you receive a call claiming to be from or about Jersey Water and feel unsure about its legitimacy, end the call immediately and contact our Customer Services team directly," the company said.
The warning follows a separate fraud alert issued in January, when the Jersey Financial Services Commission (JFSC) urged businesses to be wary of scam emails sent from an address impersonating the financial regulator.
The fraudulent messages, sent from a domain designed to mimic the JFSC's official address, informed recipients they were being contacted "regarding a matter identified in an internal review" and prompted them to click a link to access documents through a fake delivery service.
A JFSC spokesperson said: "If you receive an email like this, do not respond or click on any links or attachments."
The incidents reflect a worsening fraud problem in Jersey. States of Jersey Police data show fraud reports reached a four-year high in 2025, with losses expected to exceed £5 million.
The Jersey Consumer Council has noted that roughly 40% of all recorded crime on the island is now fraud-related, while the Channel Islands Financial Ombudsman flagged what it described as "explosive growth" in fraud complaints.
Impersonation schemes such as the water insurance scam are particularly effective because they exploit trust in recognised institutions. Research from Brandshield found that 76% of successful business impersonation scams involved communications that closely mimicked legitimate companies.
Jersey's fraud prevention framework, coordinated through the Jersey Fraud Prevention Forum and the JFSC, is considered robust but remains smaller in scale than the United Kingdom's multi-layered system.
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The Financial Conduct Authority leads or supports 20 of the 43 actions in the UK government's Economic Crime Plan, while a mandatory reimbursement scheme for authorised push payment fraud – introduced by the UK's Payment Systems Regulator in October 2024 – returned 86% of in-scope losses to victims in its first three months.
Jersey has no equivalent safety net, a gap that former head of the island's Joint Financial Crimes Unit Barry Faudemer has publicly raised concerns about.
Across the British Isles, insurance fraud through impersonation is widespread. The FCA received close to 5,000 reports of impersonation scams during the first half of 2025, with older individuals among those most frequently targeted. The regulator has urged consumers to verify the identity of any caller or sender before sharing information or making payments.
The Jersey Fraud Prevention Forum provides guidance on social media on how to identify scams and what steps to take if targeted.
