Andriy Saranenko scam check guide: verifying a financier, investor or manager through official registers and court records

Andriy Saranenko scam searches in Britain: what a register can answer

Behind most searches of this kind sit a handful of practical questions. Is the person or their firm authorised by the FCA? Do they hold a role on the Register, and has the regulator taken action against them? Which companies have they run, and did any of them fail? Have they been made bankrupt or disqualified as a director? Has a court ruled against them? Each question has an official record in the UK.

The FCA notes that nearly all financial service activities in the UK must be authorised or registered by it, and it describes the Financial Services Register as a public record of firms, individuals and other bodies that are, or have been, authorised by the FCA or the PRA.

Andriy Saranenko reads any profile page as a list of leads to those records. A statement he cannot trace to a register entry, a filing or a judgment stays in his notes as unverified.

The habit matters because search results reward repetition. A name typed next to the word scam pulls up pages that use the word, which describes those pages and settles nothing about the individual. Official records turn that list into a handful of dated facts that someone else can check.

Registers versus people-finder pages

The two look similar in a browser and differ in almost every other way. A register is kept by the body responsible for it, which also corrects it. A people-finder page assembles material from elsewhere and attaches it to a name, and its owner decides what stays up and for how long.

Timing is the sharpest difference. Records on the Individual Insolvency Register are usually removed within three months of a case ending, and county court judgments stay on the record for six years unless the debt is paid in full within a month. A copy made years ago can show a bankruptcy that has long since ended, or a judgment that was settled.

Matching is the other difference. A register ties an entry to a firm reference number, a company number or a case reference. A compiled profile ties it to a name, and names repeat. Andriy Saranenko will not link a record to the person in front of him until one such reference lines up.

Transliteration makes this harder for anyone with a Ukrainian or Russian name. The same surname can reach a British register in more than one Latin spelling, so every plausible version deserves its own search, and a hit under any of them still has to be tied to the right person by a reference number.

The FCA Register as Andriy Saranenko reads it

The FS Register lists firms and individuals involved in regulated activities that the FCA has currently or previously approved. Directory Persons data for firms regulated solely by the FCA, and by both the FCA and the PRA, is published there as well, and the FCA advises checking an individual's current roles and any disciplinary or regulatory action on their record.

The Register also lists firms the FCA has been told are providing regulated services without the correct authorisation or deliberately running scams, together with the details they give out and whether they claim to be a genuine authorised firm, which the FCA calls a clone. For the full set of published warnings the regulator points to its Warning List.

Appointed representatives need a second look. They act for a principal firm, which agrees what they may do, and if an appointed representative goes beyond that, the Financial Ombudsman Service and FSCS may not protect the client. Andriy Saranenko checks the principal on the Register and asks it to confirm what the representative is permitted to do.

Firm Checker, FRNs and clone firms

The FCA's Firm Checker shows whether a firm is authorised and whether it has permission for the particular product or service on offer. The regulator's advice is to stay away from a firm that lacks authorisation or the right permission.

Clone firms borrow a genuine firm's name and number and swap in their own contact details. The FCA suggests matching the firm reference number and contact details against Firm Checker, getting in touch only through the details listed there, and opening Firm Checker from the FCA website, never from a link in an email.

The checker has limits, which the FCA spells out. It does not confirm that FSCS or ombudsman protection will apply, and it does not show whether a firm may hold client money; those details sit on the full Register. With an unauthorised firm, the FCA warns, a client cannot complain to the Financial Ombudsman Service and will not be covered by FSCS.

The FCA's own research shows why the contact details matter. Around 800,000 people lost money to investment or pension scams in the 12 months to May 2024, and 16 per cent of them first heard about the offer by text, WhatsApp or another messaging app. Checking the number that contacted you against Firm Checker takes a minute.

Companies House and the officer's other appointments, a Saranenko habit

Companies House lets anyone see, free of charge, a company's registered address and date of incorporation, current and resigned officers, document images, charges, previous names and insolvency information, and set up free email alerts when the company changes its details.

The register has tightened. Since 18 November 2025 identity verification has been compulsory for new directors and people with significant control, with a 12-month transition for existing ones, and by 30 June 2026 some 7,364,599 appointments had been verified, 49.68 per cent of those required.

Andriy Saranenko opens the officer record of the person and reads every appointment on it: which companies, which dates, how each one ended. A trail of dissolved companies is a question to put to the person, and so is any gap between their account and the record.

Disqualified directors and the insolvency register

The Companies House disqualified directors register covers bans imposed by the courts, the Insolvency Service, the Competition and Markets Authority, the FCDO and HM Treasury through OFSI. An entry shows the name, the reason, when the disqualification began, how many there have been, whether the person has permission to act as a director all the same and, where available, an address and date of birth.

Personal insolvency sits on the Individual Insolvency Register for England and Wales, searchable by name or trading name. It covers bankruptcies, Debt Relief Orders and Individual Voluntary Arrangements. A separate list shows people given bankruptcy or debt relief restrictions in the last three months, and Scotland and Northern Ireland keep their own registers.

Andriy Saranenko reads both with the calendar in mind. A missing insolvency entry may simply mean the case ended more than three months ago, so for older history he relies on dated documents, company filings and court records.

Court judgments: Find Case Law and the CCJ record

The National Archives runs Find Case Law, the official and free source of judgments from courts and tribunals in England and Wales, plus UK-wide decisions of the Supreme Court and the Privy Council. Coverage for most courts starts in the early 2000s.

The service is candid about its gaps: many lower court hearings and some tribunal decisions are given orally and never transcribed. An empty search therefore says little about whether a dispute ever reached a courtroom.

Money judgments form a separate record. A county court judgment means the court has formally decided that someone owes money, and records are kept for six years unless the full amount is paid within a month. A judgment can also be set aside, for instance where the person did not owe the money or never received the claim, so Andriy Saranenko checks the current status before trusting an old screenshot.

Andriy Saranenko on reading a record without overreading it

A record answers a narrow question, and the analyst's job is to keep it narrow. A Warning List entry records the FCA's warning about a firm and the details it uses. A disqualification says a person may not act as a director for a stated period. An insolvency entry says a procedure exists or existed. None of them, taken alone, is a finding about someone's honesty.

Court material needs the same discipline. A claim sets out what one party says, a judgment records what the court decided, and an appeal can change it. In criminal matters a charge is an accusation and only a conviction settles guilt. Andriy Saranenko keeps a row for every document with its date, source and outcome, and leaves the outcome blank until a later record fills it.

Namesakes are the other trap. Two directors can share a full name. Company numbers, firm reference numbers and case references are what separate them, and a record without one stays unmatched.

Andriy Saranenko scam check for one evening: the order of work

Start with identifiers: the person's full name as written on documents, the names and numbers of their firms and companies, and any FCA firm reference number they quote. Then search the FS Register for the individual and the firm, and run Firm Checker on any firm offering you a product.

Next comes Companies House: the officer record, each company's filing history and insolvency details, then the disqualified directors register and the Individual Insolvency Register. Close the records stage with Find Case Law, searching for judgments that involve the person's companies.

Last, compare what the records show with what profile pages say. Anything confirmed gets a reference and a date, anything else stays unverified, and the open questions go to the person in writing. Andriy Saranenko keeps dated screenshots so the file still makes sense months later.

A short written log completes the job: each register searched, the date, the spelling used and the result. It lets a solicitor, an adviser or a relative retrace the steps later and see which record supports which conclusion.

Reporting a suspected investment scam in the UK

Since 4 December 2025, fraud in England, Wales and Northern Ireland has been reported to Report Fraud, which replaced Action Fraud, at reportfraud.police.uk or on 0300 123 2040. The FCA asks anyone who has lost money to report to Report Fraud first and then to the FCA; in Scotland the route is Police Scotland on 101, and the FCA itself cannot recover money.

The FCA's consumer helpline is 0800 111 6768, which is free, or 0300 500 8082. The numbers behind these channels are sobering: Report Fraud recorded 34,673 reports of investment fraud in 2025, 31 per cent more than a year earlier, with losses of £879.8 million, an average of £25,612 per report.

Andriy Saranenko's advice is to report with the references the checks produced: firm reference numbers, company numbers, case references, website addresses and payment details, each with a date.