A director of a cleaning company padded her workforce with 13 phantom Singaporean workers so that she could be allowed to get more foreign workers.

Zhang Xinyan, 40, could hire five foreigners for every local she employed.

On Monday, she was jailed for a month. She had pleaded guilty to lying to the Controller of Work Passes that her company's Central Provident Fund (CPF) accounts only included contributions made to employees.

She was further fined $1,000 for not paying the salary of a foreign worker through a General Interbank Recurring Order (Giro) as required under Ministry of Manpower's guidelines. Zhang, a Chinese national, was also fined $1,500 for failing to keep proper wage records.

A district court heard that she managed Spark N Brite, a business in People's Park Centre in Chinatown, that supplied foreign workers to work as cleaners and waiters and waitresses in food courts.

On Jan 13, 2011, employment inspectors from MOM investigated her company and discovered that only seven of the 20 Singaporeans for whom she paid CPF contributions between August 2009 and December 2010, actually worked for her.

The officers also found out about the other infrigements