A Nottinghamshire-based broker was this week jailed for five years for his involvement in a £600,000 motor insurance fraud.

Mansfield Insurance Services director Lee Greenacre, 23, was sentenced at Nottingham Crown Court for "conspiring to falsify documents required for accounting purposes".

Two other Mansfield Insurance employees received prison sentences for their part in the scam.

John Vale, 47, was jailed for nine months and disqualified for five years under the Director's Disqualification Act. Paul Bostram, 30, was jailed for six months.

It is understood that Greenacre, Vale and Bostram were charging customers high premiums for motor insurance, while altering details about the drivers' birth dates and criminal convictions in order to get cheaper quotes from insurers.

As a result of the fraud, insurers lost over £600,000 in premiums.

Nottinghamshire police began investigating the broker after it was inundated by calls from customers who had discovered the policies they had bought through Mansfield Insurance were invalid.

Mansfield Insurance's GISC membership ceased in November 2003.