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The warning signs were in the bank statements seven years early

Qurexa Editorial Team24 September 20266 min read 0 0
The warning signs were in the bank statements seven years early

What happened

Economic abuse is a form of domestic abuse. It means controlling someone's money: taking their wages, running up debt in their name, stopping them working, or making them account for every pound. It became a recognised form of abuse in law in England and Wales under the Domestic Abuse Act 2021. It is also very hard to see from the outside. There are no bruises. A new UK study has looked at whether it leaves a trace somewhere else: in ordinary banking records. Researchers led by Anna Trendl analysed retail bank data for 5,428 women who had experienced financial abuse in the UK, comparing them with a control group. They identified 373 indicators of financial abuse visible in the data. The striking part is the timing. Some of those signals were showing up as much as seven years before the person disclosed the abuse to anyone. The patterns were the sort of thing that looks like bad luck one month and a shape when you see it over years: savings draining away, debts climbing, credit scores sliding. The research was published in Nature in 2026, and reported alongside work from Northumbria University calling on the banking industry to design out economic abuse.

Why this matters

Roughly one in five UK adults has experienced economic abuse, according to the charity Surviving Economic Abuse. An estimated £14.4 billion of UK debt is thought to be linked to economic abuse, a figure calculated in 2020 prices, which is around £18.78 billion in today's money. The reason the seven-year figure matters so much is that it flips the usual model. Banks generally respond to abuse when someone tells them. Telling a bank requires knowing it is abuse, feeling safe enough to say so, and getting through to someone who understands. Many people never get there, and by the time they do the damage to their credit file can take years to undo. If the pattern is visible in the data years earlier, the opportunity moves much earlier too. There is also something important in the fact that the signals are gradual. Abuse is often imagined as an incident. This research describes it as a slow shape over years, which matches what survivors say and what frontline services see.

What the evidence actually says

The numbers are clear enough to quote directly. Compared with the control group, victim-survivors had credit scores 109 points lower, and were 31.9 percentage points more likely to have unpaid debts. That is a large gap. It is also, importantly, a gap between groups, not a test you can apply to one person. Plenty of people have a poor credit score and unpaid debts for reasons that have nothing to do with abuse: illness, redundancy, a business failing, the cost of living. A falling credit score is not evidence that someone is being abused. This is the central tension in the research and the authors are alive to it. A pattern that is real across thousands of accounts can produce a great many false alarms when applied to individuals. Getting it wrong could mean a bank contacting someone about abuse that is not happening, or worse, contacting them in a way an abusive partner can see. The study was also of women victim-survivors. Men experience economic abuse too, and the patterns in their data were not what this study examined. And the data comes from one set of retail bank records, so it will not capture people who have no bank account of their own, which is itself one of the more severe forms of economic control. What the research offers is not a detection algorithm ready to switch on. It is evidence that the information exists, years in advance, and a case that banks should be designing their systems with that in mind.

Qurexa perspective

We deliver medicines and shopping to people's homes across Lincolnshire, often to the same people every week, and often to people who are older, unwell or isolated. That puts our drivers and pharmacy team in a position a lot of services are not in: we see the same front doors regularly. We are not investigators and it would be wrong to pretend otherwise. But regular contact is genuinely one of the ways worrying changes get noticed, and everyone who works in a role like ours should know the basics of what economic abuse looks like and who to pass a concern to. If you are worried about someone, the right step is almost never to confront the situation yourself. It is to contact a specialist service, or in an emergency the police, and to let people who are trained handle it safely.

Practical advice

If you think this might be happening to you, or to someone you know, here is what is useful. Surviving Economic Abuse runs the Financial Support Line on 0808 196 8845, free and confidential, for people in England and Wales. The National Domestic Abuse Helpline is 0808 2000 247, free, 24 hours a day. In an emergency, call 999. If you cannot speak, call 999, then press 55 when prompted. Check your own credit report. You can get it free from the main UK credit reference agencies, and you are entitled to see what is recorded in your name. Debts you did not agree to are sometimes the first hard evidence. If you bank online and are worried someone else can see your activity, be careful about the digital trail. Many refuge and abuse charity websites have a quick-exit button for this reason. If you are supporting someone, do not push them to leave or to report. Economic abuse makes leaving expensive, and the period around leaving is the most dangerous. Listen, stay in contact, and point them to specialist help. UK banks are required to support customers in vulnerable circumstances under FCA rules, and most large banks now have a dedicated vulnerable customer team. Asking for that team directly often gets you further than a general enquiry.

What to know

A study of retail bank records for 5,428 UK women who experienced financial abuse identified 373 indicators visible in the data, some appearing up to seven years before the abuse was disclosed. Victim-survivors had credit scores 109 points lower and were 31.9 percentage points more likely to have unpaid debts than the comparison group. The findings are about patterns across large groups, not a test for individuals, and a falling credit score has many innocent explanations. Used carelessly, that kind of flag could put someone in danger. Used carefully, it suggests banks could act years earlier than they currently do. In the meantime, the specialist helplines exist, they are free, and they are the right first call. Sources: Nature, Trendl A et al., 'Banking records reveal signatures of economic abuse', 2026, https://www.nature.com/ ; Northumbria University, 'Report calls on the UK banking industry to consider interventions that design out economic abuse', 2026, https://newsroom.northumbria.ac.uk/pressreleases/report-calls-on-the-uk-banking-industry-to-consider-interventions-that-design-out-economic-abuse-3422784 ; Phys.org, 'Banking patterns could help identify people experiencing financial abuse, UK study finds', September 2026, https://phys.org/news/2026-09-banking-patterns-people-experiencing-financial.html This article is for general information and does not replace advice from a doctor, pharmacist or other qualified healthcare professional.

#economic abuse#domestic abuse#banking#financial health#safeguarding#research

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