There is a big community of commercial and private investigation services in the UK and internationally. Like lawyers and estate agents, this industry, for different reasons has a certain negative perception, and this is especially the case at the moment with the scandal involving phone hacking and the prominent role of private investigators in this.
However, investigators provide a vital role in may different ways, and there are some very talented and ethical people who work in the field. In addition, whilst we are in no way condoning any unlawful or illegal activity, if you are dealing with a fraudster who has stolen perhaps sums into the millions and dissipated or laundered those assets, often to jurisdictions such as Switzerland, the BVI or any other safe haven, there is an argument that you need to think like the fraudster to maximise the chance of recovery.
In terms of investigative services, it is invariably better to follow the adage that “prevention is better than cure” and an increasingly popular use of high end investigators is on background checks or due diligence before entering into a significant transaction or dealing with a business or entity which you do not know or which is in a different legal jurisdiction. Due diligence is a concept well known to both solicitors and accountants and if, for example, you are buying a business, almost certainly your solicitors and accountants will recommend some due diligence and also to insert a large number of warranties to be given by the sellers on sale. This is all well and good, and often valuable, but paperwork such as accounts will only ever give you part of the picture and any warranties are only worth the value of the people behind them. Often of more value is to know, what is the real background and business reputation of the individuals you are dealing with – are there good reasons to trust them or not ? Now that’s useful information.
Other types of investigators may investigate personal injury or insurance claims, some undertake surveillance or ground visits and anciliary services are often available such as process servers.
Finally, much of the work undertaken by solicitors, particularly litigation solicitors and fraud solicitors is investigative based, and this again demonstrates the very wide spectrum of this work.