Because we can work on an unconflicted basis we believe there is ample room

Because we can work on an unconflicted basis we believe there is ample room in the market for us.". General hospitals will be able to choose between making enormous savings or treating thousands more patients a year if they adopt better financial management practices, according to a study conducted by District Audit, the body that conducts most NHS trust audits. It is more powerful than being tied to people in-house."Clients may prefer to use their own accountants for forensic work, says Rick Helsby of Coopers and Lybrand. "A client's own accountant will already understand the needs of his particular business, which somebody called in by a solicitor is unlikely to do." However the truth - as Mr Helsby admits - is that his firm is unable to take on between 20 and 40 per cent of the forensic work it is offered because of conflict of interest.It was precisely this problem which led to the departure of Messrs Lee and Allen from Price Waterhouse.

We are very case-driven: we are not interested in managing a great big body of people." To acquire the necessary breadth of experience, the firm - launched last year by David Lee, former head of special investigations at Price Waterhouse, and his colleague Tim Allen - has set up a banking panel composed of independent consultants with expertise in different fields including derivatives, foreign exchange and investments "This gives us great flexibility. They need specialists within the specialism." For this reason Ms Bond has taken on experts in white collar crime, intellectual property, tax and customs and computers - and is planning to expand her team.David Lee at Lee and Allen is aware that as a small niche practice his firm lacks the infrastructure of its competitors "On sheer numbers we can't compete and nor would we want to. You also need investigative and interviewing skills, tenacity and an eye for detail."So can the two newcomers on the scene compete? Definitely, says Monica Bond, who heads the new London office of Lindquist Avey. "I can draw on the resources of any of 250 specialist forensic and investigative accountants in the Lindquist Avey group internationally and I complement the permanent staff in the London office with consultants who are specialists in a particular field on an ad hoc basis."The advantage of a specialist practice is that while auditors look at the figures, we look behind them I see it from the instructing solicitor's viewpoint. However, because this is a totally unregulated field, a couple of practices have decided to establish a formal link with a particular agency in order to ensure control, confidentiality and conformity of standards. Others are considering following suit.For the first few years of the forensic accounting boom, the Big Six had it pretty much all their own way.

Martin Foster of KPMG emphasises the value of being able to draw on specialists from other departments in the firm. "It is very useful to be familiar with particular types of investigation or certain areas of industry so you know exactly what you are looking for. "Corporations take layers out of management and that tends to open up opportunities for people to beat the system. Sometimes this is for personal gain but sometimes there is no direct benefit other than the appearance of delivering better results to bosses than is actually the case."To deal with the investigations side, most firms have brought ex-policemen on board, often of senior rank.

If the services of an investigation agency are needed, it is their job to supervise the agency's work. Forensic accountants may be called in before a fraud is even alleged as when Coopers was asked to computer scan the National Power/PowerGen share issue for possible multiple applications. Instructions come directly from the client or through solicitors. If a case reaches court the accountant will appear as an expert witness.The huge rise in fraud over the past few years has accounted for much of the growth in business. Martin Foster, UK head of forensic accounting at KPMG, lays some of the blame for this rise on the pressure on employees to perform. Staff travelled half of Europe in their search.Not all jobs have this glamour.