Woman who helped dupe academy into disbursing nearly $18k in public funds jailed

A design firm's part-time employee submitted falsified payslips to an academy which Workforce Singapore (WSG) - a statutory board under the Ministry of Manpower - had appointed as a programme manager for a Government-linked initiative.

Leow Yee Ling, 55, was then working as an administrative support staff for Firstpage Digital Design, and the prosecution said that she did so to support her then-boss' scheme to cheat the Supply Chain and Logistics Academy (Scala) of salary support grants.

Leow committed the offences from April to October 2018, and Scala was then duped into disbursing nearly $18,000 in public funds.

On Sept 24, the Singaporean, who has since made more than $17,900 in restitution, was sentenced to four months' jail after she pleaded guilty to a cheating charge.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Louis Ngia told the court that even though Leow was not the mastermind of the scheme, she had played an integral role in its execution.

The case involving Malaysian Ng Yuen Fei, 41, who was her boss and a director at Firstpage at the time of the offences, is pending.

DPP Ngia said that WSG's mission is to enable Singaporeans to access good job opportunities and build their careers at every stage of their lives.

He added that WSG funded an initiative known as the Professional Conversion Programme (PCP), aimed at helping mid-career professional, managers, executives and technicians jobseekers reskill to join a new industry.

Scala was in charge of administering PCP's logistics for WSG, the court heard.

The academy's roles included administering applications into the PCP, and disbursing WSG's public funds to participating employers.

The prosecutor told the court that companies could enrol their newly-hired employees for the logistics industry PCP to train them. However, only full-time employees undergoing skills conversion to move into the logistics sector were eligible for the logistics PCP.

Participating employers had to send enrolled staff members for Scala's logistics course, and provide on-the-job training (OJT) for them. WSG's funds were then used to support the employers' re-training of the enrolled staff members.

DPP Ngia said that in late 2017, Ng, who is also known as Andrea, learnt about the PCP and hatched a plan to cheat Scala.

He added: "She enrolled employees into the PCP and falsely inflated their salaries, so that Firstpage would get a higher salary support grant sum than it ought to receive under the PCP.

"Andrea also recruited individuals as 'employees' with Firstpage, for the purpose of enrolling them into the PCP. These were not genuine employees, as they did not do any work for Firstpage."

The prosecutor said that such "employees" were not paid the salaries stated in their employment contract. Their only role in Firstpage was to go for the PCP training course which Scala administered, he added.

Court documents stated that Ng hired Leow, who started working for Firstpage in December 2017. The two women agreed that Leow would work on a part-time basis, and be paid $13 an hour.

According to court documents, Leow also agreed with Ng's plan to enrol her with Scala for the logistics PCP.

DPP Ngia said that as part of Leow's PCP application in January 2018, Ng submitted to Scala a purported employment contract, falsely stating that the older woman was a full-time employee earning $4,000 a month.

Leow, who was initially unaware about the false employment contract, was successfully enrolled into the PCP soon after, and went through a Scala training course.

The prosecutor said that she later found out from another director at Firstpage that Ng had informed Scala that Leow's pay was purportedly $4,000 a month. This director then advised Leow to "be careful".

Despite this warning, Leow later followed Ng instructions and submitted false payslips to Scala, said DPP Ngia.

He added: "In addition, following Andrea's instructions, (Leow) falsely filled in training dates and details in her OJT logbook. She did not undergo any specific OJT training as outlined in the...logbook."

After that, Leow submitted the logbook to Scala to support her fraudulent salary support grant application.

Separately, she prepared false supporting documents for the grant by using the names of other individuals who were not genuine employees of Firstpage.

Leow also filled OJT logbooks that purportedly belonged to these "employees". She then submitted these false logbooks and payslips to Scala.

For cheating, an offender can be jailed for up to three years and fined.