Back then (70s & 80s) clocking cars was incredibly commonplace as was buying service history from written-off cars and opening up your non serviced car's service book and swapping the pages, which took seconds by just opening the staples. £100 blow overs (resprays) were the order of the day for high mileage cars such as ex taxis and second-hand engines, gearboxes, and diffs were changed in hours with ones from breakers.
Ringing and cutting and shutting was also commonplace, but sometimes cutting a straight quarter into a car was better than the repairs done by some of the hapless twats that professed to be "auto body specialists"!
The biggest crooks and the most deceptive was actually the public though. It's no different today for them either whilst the Motor Trade has had to up its game due to accountability. I've heard on many a car and bike forum people saying, its fucked I'll part ex it and somehow this is acceptable, but folk don't like it when Dealers do it as well!

