BT Italy false accounting trial starts in Milan

MILAN: A trial into alleged false accounting at the Italian unit of British Telecom in 2015 and 2016 opened in Milan on Tuesday, with 20 defendants, including two former senior BT executives and the Italian subsidiary itself, facing charges.

Milan prosecutors allege that a network of BT Italy employees inflated revenues, faked contract renewals and invoices and invented bogus supplier transactions in order to disguise the unit’s true financial performance.

BT took a 530 million pound ($725 million) charge in its accounts in 2017 relating to the alleged false accounting.