Infidelity Inc: The boom in websites offering illicit encounters for out-of-work high-fliers and how their partners cope

By Sadie Nicholas for MailOnline
Updated: 04:25 EDT, 7 April 2009

Katy Lewis was cleaning the office at home one Saturday last month when she noticed a piece of paper screwed up on the floor behind the wicker bin. On it her husband Robert had written the names and numbers of two women. 

'My stomach churned,' remembers Katy, 38, a legal executive from Manchester. 'Female intuition told me to be concerned immediately.'

When she logged on to the computer and scrolled through the history of recent internet searches she discovered her husband of five years, a surveyor, had been surfing websites designed for married people hoping to have affairs.

'I ran to the bathroom to throw up, then I realised it made sense of a lot of things. Robert had been a nightmare to live with for two months since he'd been warned that his was one of countless jobs at risk of redundancy. 

Infidelity: Becoming more common in the recession

'Property professionals have been hit hard by the recession. He was irritable, couldn't sleep, didn't want sex and would row with me over the slightest thing. He'd also started coming home later from work and though he insisted it was because he was trying to protect his job, I hadn't been convinced.'

Faced with Katy's evidence, Robert confessed that he'd had a series of illicit liaisons with married women he'd met on the internet who, like him, had been seeking an 'escape' from the economic doom and gloom.

While many a company flounders, infidelity is positively booming because of the recession, yielding massive financial rewards for those who rely on other people's extra-marital misdemeanours for their income.

Bed-hopping is, after all, pretty much free, save the odd drink to sweeten a lover or the fee for joining a website for would-be cheaters. David Rees is founder and director of marriedandlooking.co.uk, one such site aimed at facilitating affairs among married people.

'In the past six months, we've seen a 25 per cent increase in members versus the previous six months, and it's certainly being driven by the recession,' says Rees, an entrepreneur who has been happily married for 15 years.

He launched his website in 2001 and it operates like other dating sites with members posting profiles for others to see.

'We have almost 10,000 members, all of them married and most of them professional and aged 25 to 50. There are lots of company directors and highflyers on there and men outnumber women by three to one.

'Research indicates that 40 per cent of the people registered on singles dating websites are actually married, so ironically ours is a much more honest proposition. 

'Members tell us that they want to relieve the stresses caused by worrying about their jobs or businesses. But frequently those stresses are exacerbated at home where they argue with their spouse over finances or the school fees.

'So they join our site in search of no-strings sexual encounters with people who are also married and, therefore, have the same to lose. On average most people are members for six months and will have around two encounters during that time. These aren't serial philanderers, they just want a quick outlet without risking their marriage or getting involved.'

There are many websites catering for those who want to have an extra-marital affair

And while Rees admits that his website is 'contentious', he seems able to ignore the possible wider implications of infidelity - shattered families and untold heartache. At present, his business-is earning him a small fortune-with membership starting at £15.99 per month.

He says: 'Infidelity has gone from being a niche market when we first launched eight years ago to verging on mainstream now,' he adds. 'I'm not morally disturbed by what I do, it's a business that's serving an obvious need which has only got greater due to recession.'

Howard James is marketing director of one of the newest sex-driven matchmaking websites, forgetdinner.co.uk, aimed at those who want to bypass dating and get straight to the bedroom. 

'Although we are aimed at singles, there are almost certainly married people using Forget Dinner to facilitate affairs right now,' he says. 'Given the no-strings, fun nature of the site it will be attractive to those trapped in an unhappy marriage who want an uncomplicated sexual liaison.

'In the three months since the site launched, half a million people have registered and they're all looking for the same thing - casual encounters without the hearts and flowers. The recession has had a massive impact. So many people are worrying about job security or finding a job and sex is a great way to relieve that stress.' 

With the internet making it so easy for people to cheat on their partners, small wonder that software developer Andy Felton is cashing in on infidelity. He developed Your-Spy.co.uk, a computer software programme that monitors your spouse's email and internet activity once downloaded discreetly onto their computer or laptop. 

Be your own super-sleuth: Programs like You-Spy enable you to personally find out whether your partner's cheating

As suspicious partners seek to be their own super sleuths, more than 300 a week are downloading Your-Spy at £29.99 a time.

'Research we've conducted with almost 600 office workers across the UK reveals that, with concerns over money and job security, people are more likely to engage in illicit affairs right now than ever before,' says Felton. 'Facebook is having a real influence on affairs, making it easy to trace old flames and acquaintances and for those in long-term relationships to stray.'

That's where YourSpy comes in as it lets you see exactly what they've been emailing and to whom. If they're communicating with a lover over the internet then it will record all the evidence you need that an affair is either taking place or in the offing.

Internal communications manager Claire Thurman, 35, from Bishop's Stortford, in Hertfordshire, is divorcing her husband Nathan, 39, after discovering he was having an affair when he was made redundant from a City bank last autumn.

'Instead of focusing on finding a new job he was going out for boozy lunches every day with colleagues who'd also been made redundant,' Claire says. 'After a month he was still going out every day I started to quiz him. He became very defensive which made me question him further.

So I hired a detective to follow him on one of these lunches in November. That's when I discovered that the "group of former colleagues" was just one colleague called Charlotte, and the venue was her bedroom.'

He told me I could never have understood how it felt to lose his job in the same way that Charlotte had, which broke my heart.

Despite all this extra-marital activity, surprisingly there's a decrease in the number of people filing for divorce. But lawyer Paul Thorn of Wake Smith & Tofields in Sheffield warns that we shouldn't be lulled into a false sense of security by these latest figures.

He says: 'The true extent of recession infidelity will only become clear once the economy picks up, when divorce rates may soar with people citing all sorts of affairs as reasons for their marriages breaking down.'

At which point the divorce lawyers will join the merry band already cashing in on the highly lucrative business that is Infidelity Inc.