Four men masterminded a ruse to cheat the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA) which lost $51,000, a district court heard.
One of them, Tay Sheng Yang, 28, also known as Allister, was jailed for two years after pleading guilty to 19 cheating charges and one count of obstructing the course of justice. He committed all the offences in 2016. The cases involving the other three men - Lim Biao, 27, Ng Yong Jing, 28, and Joshua Tan Jun Liang, also 28 - are pending.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Grace Goh said the SkillsFuture Credits (SFC) scheme was launched in January 2016 to encourage individuals to take ownership of their skills development and lifelong learning.
Under the scheme, all Singaporeans aged 25 and above would receive an opening credit of $500 in their SFC account which can be used to pay for approved courses.
The court heard on Monday that Tay was one of the directors of two companies, A.I. Industries and Alliance Continens. Between February and March 2016, WDA approved four courses to be funded by the SFC under the two firms. They were in areas such as professional selling and financial modelling.
DPP Goh said Ng, also known as Sean, was the only trainer for both firms. "Sometime in early 2016, Allister and Sean discussed an idea to increase the sales of courses offered by (their firms) by giving referral fees to persons who referred trainees to register for the... courses," she said.
The court heard that Lim, who knew the pair during their university days, later became involved and the trio also talked about giving cash directly to trainees as part of an effort to increase sales. Lim later told Tan, his secondary school friend, about the plan.
The DPP said a training provider under the SFC scheme was not supposed to pay trainees from their disbursed SFC or even enter into such agreements.
In April 2016, a company known as C.G. Marketing (CGM) was set up with the sole purpose of promoting A.I. Industries and Alliance Continens. Lim was its sole director with Tan as its manager. Sales staff were recruited to promote the courses and one of them was Muhammad Hakimmul Hisham Razni, 35.
The DPP said: "Sean, Lim Biao, Joshua and Allister initiated a plan to cheat WDA by submitting inflated SFC claims. By having CGM give cashbacks for course registration, the plan encouraged a high sign-up rate for courses offered by A.I. Industries without trainees actually attending the courses. As a result, the WDA was cheated into delivering a total of $51,000 to A.I. Industries."
She added that Hakimmul recruited 51 trainees and a total of 102 inflated claims were submitted to WDA. He was sentenced on Monday to 24 weeks' jail after pleading guilty to nine cheating charges.
