One of the UK’s most prolific tax fraudsters has lost his appeal against a judge’s order to repay more than £90m he gained through his shameless scams. Convicted criminal Arif Patel, 58, fled Britain for Dubai back in 2011 but three years ago he received a 20-year jail sentence after leading one of the UK’s biggest ‘carousel tax’ frauds. Carousel fraud involves chains of fake business transactions used to steal VAT repayments; goods move between different companies in a circular pattern, creating false export and import records that criminals use to claim large sums back from tax authorities. In 2023 Chester Crown Court heard Patel, of Preston, Lancashire, ran an international organised crime group that stole tens of millions of pounds of public money through the complex tax fraud.
He was convicted in his absence of offences including conspiracies to cheat His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC), the importation and sale of counterfeit goods and money-laundering – and a judge issued a confiscation order requiring him to repay £90.5m and his Ferrari – but Patel appealed through his UK legal team. Now, in a written judgment this week, the Court of Appeal rejected his claim that the size of his property empire, seized by the court-appointed receiver in 2010, had not kept pace with inflation and that the £90m order was unfair.
Following Patel’s conviction the judge ruled that between 2003 and 2008, he made £52.7m through his crimes, which included £33.4m of taxpayers’ money stolen through VAT fraud and more than £19m made from the large-scale importation and sale of fake designer goods. But when the confiscation order was made in 2025, that figure had been increased to £90.5m to account for inflation.
The judgment said Patel would not have faced a significantly larger total sum had he “accepted at the outset his criminality, disclosed his criminal benefits and agreed to forfeit them”. Patel’s legal team also argued that he did not have assets to cover this amount, an argument that was also rejected.
The judgment said Patel “appears to have been able to live in very comfortable circumstances in the UAE for 15 years without identified means of support”. It added the judge who made the original confiscation order was entitled to conclude that by the time Patel absconded in 2011, he would have had “many millions of truly hidden assets”.
The judgment also revealed Patel failed to cooperate with an official receiver whose job it was to identify his assets in Dubai, adding: “I gather that the applicant procured the receiver’s arrest when he went to the UAE.” Work will now begin to sell off Patel’s property empire. All funds raised will be returned to the taxpayer.
Adrian Foster, of the Crown Prosecution Service’s Proceeds of Crime Division, said: “The CPS has worked closely with HMRC and Lancashire Police to ensure that Arif Patel could not keep the benefit from his fake counterfeit designer clothes scam and fraudulent VAT claims. This judgment reinforces that we will work tirelessly to prosecute international illicit finance and corruption, along with any appeals that flow from it.”
In the early part of the millennium, Patel’s company Faisaltex – based in Preston – was known for manufacturing textiles such as socks and nighties, which it supplied to retailers. But behind the facade, Patel was at the helm of one of the country’s biggest ever VAT frauds, known as a carousel fraud.
Patel’s criminal empire was uncovered in a series of raids in 2008, which followed a years’ long investigation by HMRC and Lancashire Police. Last month File on 4 Investigates revealed Patel’s glamorous life in Dubai, and his claims that he had made sizeable donations to charitable organisations.
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