The company, which has hundreds of millions of pounds locked up in public sector contracts, also revealed that it is currently under investigation by Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC), according to a report in The Times.

Internal auditors found that the business accounts had exaggerated the company's income from the NPfIT by millions of pounds over a four-year period, which has resulted in a number of staff members being suspended.

CSC is in talks with the UK government over the failed NHS National Programme for IT, which may lead to the company having to write off the entire £957 million investment it made in the programme.

A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was due to be reached in April, but this has now been extended to June after failed negotiations.

The company has commented on the latest news that the income exaggeration was "an internal CSC accounting error and has no impact on our charges made to the NHS. It is entirely a matter for CSC and does not impact the NHS."