A woman at the centre of one of Britain’s biggest-ever benefits scams has only paid back just £18,000.
Tsvetka Todorova, 54, made thousands of false social welfare claims as part of a gang of fraudsters that pocketed £54million of taxpayer money.
She was imprisoned for three years in May 2024, having made £263,514 from the welfare plot.
Todorova was released in late 2025, with the courts ordering her to cough up £101,201.78 in January.
But Todorova has only handed over £18,228.14, the Crown Prosecution Service confirmed to .
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Todorova missed the July deadline to pay the sum in full – a deadline which had already been extended – and interest is now piling up.
Enforcement of this owed money, first reported by The Sun, is ongoing.
The Bulgarian national has not been taken into custody. She faces deportation and could also be sent back to jail for failing to meet the confiscation order.
Who is Tsvetka Todorova?
Todorova and four other Bulgarian nationals used false identities to lodge benefits claims from October 2016 to 2021.
Todorova, Galina Nikolova, Stoyan Stoyanov, Gyunesh Ali, and Patritsia Paneva, 26, used forged documents to fool the Department for Work and Pensions.
If officials denied their counterfeit claims, the group’s ‘benefits factories’ kept re-applying until they were approved.
Group members used the bundles of banknotes to buy a luxury car and designer goods like Rolex watches before they were arrested in May 2021.
The ring was uncovered after a police officer in Sliven, Bulgaria, tipped off British authorities.
All six pleaded guilty to fraud and money laundering and were jailed in April 2024.
Prosecutors described it as the ‘largest benefit fraud prosecution ever brought to the courts in England and Wales’.
She told the Daily Mail in January this year: ‘I love it here; it is good and has helped me. I’ve been back on benefits since December 30.
‘It’ll be about £200 a month. I don’t have a right to work. My husband gets over £1,000 for Universal Credit.’
Todorova’s husband is suffering from depression – people with the mental health condition can be eligible for certain benefits.
The Erith local added: ‘I’m depressed as well. I have had high blood pressure because of the case. My husband also has a lot of back pain.’
The DWP has been approached for comment. It previously said that the department is ‘taking rigorous action to recover the stolen funds’.
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