The most costly corporate mistakes in the UK.

One of the key aims of the enterprise risk management process is to help businesses identify and assess potential threats to their organisation. Some threats may be deemed relatively low risk, but others can turn into extremely costly issues. 

These costly corporate mistakes may actually be more commonplace than organisations realise. For example, there have been 375 corporate fines over £1 million issued by UK authorities in the last five years alone. 

To spotlight which corporate threats can be the most costly to organisations, we have researched data from the Good Jobs First Violation Tracker, and analysed every corporate fine issued in the United Kingdom from 2020-2024. 

The key findings from the research are:

• There have been more than 36,000 corporate fines issued in the UK between 2020 and 2024, costing businesses more than £7.6 billion
• Airbus have been issued with the costliest fines, adding up to over £1 billion across three violations
• The most common group of corporate offences are employment related offences, but the most costly are competition related offences
• The corporate mistake most likely to land you with a fine is a labour standards violation, with the most costly being bribery
• Companies based in London have received the highest number of fines, and the highest sum of all fines
• Belfast is the city with the most fines per business located in the city, and Westminster has the least

The most common corporate offences

* Number of corporate fines ranked by offence group

Our findings revealed that the most common type of corporate offences are employment related. There have been over 21,000 fines in the last five years handed out to UK businesses for employment violations. 94% of employment related offences are for labour standards violations. 59% of all recorded offences were employment related offences.

The second most common type of offences are safety related. 15% of all fines were issued for safety related offences, the most common type being workplace safety or health violations. 

12% of all violations are consumer protection related, followed by 9% for financial offences, and 2% each for healthcare, and environment related violations. 

The most costly corporate offences

* Cost of corporate fines ranked by offence group

Despite competition related offences making up only 0.3% of all violations, the 188 fines issued from 2020 - 2024, accounted for more than £3 billion, the most costly fines of the seven categories. The average cost per fine for a competition related violation is £26.1 million, also the highest of the seven groups. 

Two thirds of competition related fines have been for bribery violations. The seven bribery violations have been penalised with an average fine of £300 million, costing businesses £2.1 billion over the last five years. 

Financial related offences had the second highest total cost accumulated in fines at £2.4 billion. Anti-money-laundering deficiencies have cost businesses the most, accounting for £587 million in fines. Financial related offences also have the second highest average fine at £733k. 

The third most costly fines have been for consumer protection related offences. These violations have totaled over £1.3 billion in fines, with an average cost of £303k per fine. 

Although employment related offences are the most common type of violations, they have the third lowest total cost in fines at £272 million. They also have the lowest average fine per violation at £12.6k. 

The costliest corporate violations for UK businesses

* Cost of corporate fines ranked by violation

Digging deeper into the type of violations that are most costly to businesses, our research revealed that bribery violations have cost companies the most since the turn of the decade, with more than £2.1 billion issued in fines.

Fines for investor protection violations added up to £737 million, the second highest total for any individual offence. Investor protection violations are issued with an average fine of £23.8 million. Of all of the violations with 10+ fines issued in the five year period analysed, investor protection violations had the highest average fine. 

The most common violation was labour standards violations, making up 55% of all corporate penalties. Workplace safety or health violations and consumer protection violations are the second and third most frequent violations, accounting for 15% and 10% of all violations respectively. 

The companies with the most expensive corporate fines

* Highest total cost of fines by company

Based on all of the corporate violations penalised by the United Kingdom from 2020 - 2024, Airbus have the unfortunate distinction of accumulating the most expenses in corporate fines. The airline manufacturer has been penalised 3 times, with all of their fines adding up to more than £1 billion. 

Airbus were fined £991 million for a bribery violation by the UK Serious Fraud Office, which also included a fine of €2.1 billion to French authorities, and $587 million to the US DoJ. This is the largest fine issued by UK authorities in the 2020’s. 

The second highest fine was issued by HMRC to Entain PLC, also for a bribery violation. Entain agreed to pay £585 million in penalties and disgorgement of profits, make a charitable donation of £20 million, and pay costs of £10 million, in a Deferred Prosecution Agreement which alleged failures by the company to have adequate procedures to prevent bribery at its former Turkish gambling operations.

The third most expensive fine was issued to Link Fund Solutions in 2024. The company that provides retirement planning services agreed to pay restitution to investors in the LF Woodford Equity Income Fund of £298 million. The FCA findings determined that Link failed to act with due care and diligence in its role as Authorised Corporate Director for the LF Woodford Equity Income Fund, which was shut down in 2019. 

From 2020 - 2024, there have been 15 fines issued for £100 million or more - six for competition related offences, five for financial offences, and four caused by consumer protection related violations. 

The companies with the highest number of total violations from 2020 - 2024 are as follows:

1: Clarion Housing Group Limited - 288 violations

2: London & Quadrant Group - 278 violations

3: Peabody Trust - 175 violations

4: Hyde Housing Association - 131 violations

5: Guinness Partnership - 130 violations

6: Southern Housing Group Limited - 125 violations

=7: Notting Hill Genesis - 121 violations

=7: Thames Valley Housing Association Limited - 121 violations

9: Clarity Products Ltd.  - 102 violations

10: The Riverside Group Limited - 92 violations

The industries with the most corporate fines

* Highest total cost of fines by industry

The industry that has been hit with the most expensive fines by UK authorities is the financial services sector. There have been 171 violations against financial services companies, with all of the costs adding up to £2.1 billion, an average fine of £12.3 million.

The Aerospace and Military Contracting industry also gets hit hard by corporate fines. The average fine per violation of £60.2 million is the highest industry average, with the 17 fines adding up to over £1 billion. This is however skewed by the £991 million fine to Airbus for a bribery violation. 

Companies that offer business services are the most frequent offenders, with 201 violations during the five year period analysed. Retailers (183), financial services businesses (171), utilities and power generation companies (167), and private equity firms (130), are also frequent offenders with 100+ violations.

The UK cities with the most corporate fines 

Number of corporate fines by city of company HQ

Our research also analysed which cities in the UK have the best and worst behaved businesses. To do so, we used the location provided for the company via the Good Jobs First Violation Tracker. If a location for the fined company wasn’t available, we used the location of their parent company’s headquarters at the time of the penalty announcement. To ensure a relevant enough sample size for each location, we only analysed places with 10+ violations from 2020-2024.

Please note that due to inconsistencies in the location provided by the tracker distinguishing between London as The City of London and the wider Greater London area, London based companies have been omitted from this part of our analysis. 

Companies based in Birmingham are penalised with the most corporate fines. Birmingham based companies have been issued with 153 corporate fines over the five year period analysed, an average of 30 per year. Birmingham companies also accumulated the highest total sum of fines at £13.4 million. 

The second highest number of violations are for companies located in Manchester, with 117 in total. Although Manchester has the second highest number of violations, eight other cities have a higher total value of fines issued.  

Also in the top 5 cities with the highest count of violations are Glasgow, Belfast, and Leeds. The top 5 cities with the highest value of combined fines are Birmingham, Liverpool, Leeds, Nottingham, and Stoke-on-Trent. 

The UK cities with the most corporate fines per 1,000 businesses

Number of corporate fines per 1,000 local businesses

To compare each location on a more even playing field, we used ONS data to weight the number of violations by the number of businesses registered in each city. 

When doing this, we found that for every 1,000 businesses based in Belfast, there are 7.3 corporate violations, the highest businesses to violations ratio for any UK location. 

The second worst behaved businesses are based in Nottingham, where there are 5.8 penalties issued for every 1,000 local businesses. The rest of the top 5 are made up of Southampton (4.91), Lincoln (4.81), and Glasgow (4.63).

Of the 54 cities where data on the number of local businesses is available, the best behaved city was found to be Winchester, where there are just 0.35 violations per 1,000 businesses. Also in the top 5 cities with the best behaved businesses are Chichester with 0.72 per 1,000 businesses, followed by Wrexham (0.73), Salford (0.88), and St. Albans (0.95).

Methodology

• Data on corporate violations has been collected via the Good Jobs First Violation Tracker
• The time period analysed was 2020 - 2024, for all violations penalised by UK authorities (this also includes non-UK based businesses that have been fined by UK authorities)
• Categorisation of offence groups and types, as well as the company industry, is based on the data provided by the Violation Tracker
• For the location of the offending company, this is based on the city/town provided for the offending company by the Violation Tracker, or in the event that a location is unavailable for the company, the location provided for the parent company HQ was used
• Due to inconsistencies in the location provided by the tracker distinguishing between London as The City of London and the wider Greater London area, London based companies have been omitted from our analysis
• For the companies with the most violations, the parent company has been primarily used which can account for multiple companies, or in the event that a parent company isn’t listed, the offending company has been used
• The number of businesses located in each city is taken from the UK Government Office of National Statistics Business Demography report
• Data collected and is correct as of May 2025