The recent National Crime Agency (NCA) and National Federation of Builders (NFB) campaign, reported across industry publications including Construction Enquirer, should serve as a serious warning to the construction sector.
Their warning is clear: criminals are taking advantage of “complex supply chains, frequent high value payments and reliance on emails to communicate payment instructions which criminals can compromise.”
Invoice fraud in construction is increasing – and the risk is growing
The impact is hard to ignore. In 2024/2025, in just one month, businesses lost £3.9 million across 83 cases, with construction and manufacturing responsible for 25% of all invoice fraud incidents that year (Source: NCA). These attacks aren’t small lapses – they’re often enough to seriously disrupt cashflow or halt projects entirely.
The takeaway? Email and PDFs are no longer sustainable or secure processes for handling invoices; they’re simply not built for the risks we now face.
The scale of invoice fraud in construction
Recent data from the National Crime Agency highlights just how widespread invoice fraud in construction has become:
Why email and PDF invoices are vulnerable to fraud
PDF invoices sent by email became the norm because they were quick, familiar and easy to send. But “easy” doesn’t equal “secure.”
The weaknesses are now undeniable:
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PDFs can be interfered with or spoofed in transit.
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Email accounts — even trusted ones — can be hacked or impersonated.
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Fraudsters often apply pressure with “urgent payment” messages.
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Bank details can be changed without any obvious trace left behind.
As the NCA notes, a single fraudulent payment can “destroy” a business’s cashflow. It’s not a theoretical threat — it’s happening.
And with a better, safer route now widely available, sticking with these outdated processes no longer makes sense.
How digital e-Invoicing prevents invoice fraud
Invoice fraud typically involves criminals intercepting or altering payment details to redirect funds to fraudulent accounts. Shifting to secure, end-to-end digital e-Invoicing removes the weak points fraudsters exploit. This approach builds in the protections email can never offer:
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Authenticity of origin: suppliers submitting invoices are verified, so you know exactly who they’re coming from.
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Integrity of content: digital invoice exchanges can be encrypted to protect against tampering.
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Full traceability and audit trail: every invoice has a clear digital footprint — who sent it, when, and via which secure channel.
Nothing gets lost, buried or altered without record.
This aligns directly with HMRC’s case to mandate e-Invoicing to help organisations be efficient, competitive, and able to effectively manage their cash flows.
What the Fair Payment Code means for secure invoicing
The Fair Payment Code (FPC) aims to encourage timely, transparent, dependable payment across the construction supply chain. But the industry can’t achieve fair or reliable payment if invoices:
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arrive in insecure formats
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can’t be easily verified
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can be disputed due to tampering
By making invoices authentic, accurate and traceable, digital e-Invoicing strengthens the very foundation the FPC depends on.
Put simply: you can’t have fair payment without secure, dependable invoicing.
Mandatory e-Invoicing in the UK: what happens next?
The UK is moving firmly toward mandatory e-Invoicing. Soon, every VAT-registered organisation will need to operate within these secure digital standards.
Yes, moving away from email and PDF invoices may involve a short-term adjustment in back-office processes – but the long-term benefits are worth it: stronger protection, faster processing, efficient operations, and more predictable payments across the entire supply chain.
Construction companies should start preparing now for upcoming requirements, using practical guidance such as this construction e-invoicing readiness checklist to assess their current processes and identify gaps.
CausewayOne e-Invoicing for secure construction payments
CausewayOne e-Invoicing already delivers what the NCA campaign is calling for:
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Encrypted, end-to-end exchange
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Authenticity and data integrity built in
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A fully traceable, auditable invoice lifecycle
- Verified trading partners
- Automation that reduces human error and manual touchpoints
It offers the secure, scalable invoicing model the industry needs – fully aligned with the NCA’s warnings, the Fair Payment Code, competitive operations and the direction of UK digital invoicing policy.
At Causeway, we work closely with construction finance teams to address these challenges every day.
For a deeper look at what the UK e-Invoicing mandate means in practice for construction businesses - and how to protect your finance operations from rising invoice fraud - watch our on-demand webinar on the UK e-invoicing mandate. It breaks down what’s changing across the construction sector, what organisations need to do next, and how to move away from vulnerable processes before they become a liability.
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