Man jailed for submitting fake payslips to banks for $180,000 in loans
SINGAPORE — Facing mounting debts from gambling on horse races, a coffee stall operator conspired with a friend to submit false documents to banks to get loans, a court heard.
Ng Leok Soon, 66, submitted payslips in 2012 stating that he was working as an engineer earning around $20,000 monthly.
As a result, he cheated banks out of $181,669 in total.
He used the money to repay debts to loansharks and also bought an iPad tablet so that he could place bets online.
At the State Courts on Monday (24 June), Ng was jailed for one year and seven months after he pleaded guilty to two out of four cheating charges. The other two counts were considered in sentencing as part of his plea bargain.
Roped in friend
Ng operated a coffee stall at Redhill Food Centre at 85 Redhill Lane.
In September 2012, Ng told his friend Alvin Chua Yuen Shen, 46, that he was heavily in debt and wanted to borrow a large sum of money. Chua worked as a customer acquisition officer with eFusion Solutions, a telemarketing company.
Chua told Ng that he could get others to secure bank loans for Ng. In return, these accomplices would get a 20 per cent cut of the amount that was disbursed. Ng agreed to the conspiracy.
On 17 September 2012, Ng met Chua at his office. Chua passed Ng four payslips from CGGVeritas Services (Singapore) for the months of June to September 2012. The company provides geological, geophysical and reservoir capabilities to customers.
Chua then asked his colleague Toh Hong Guan, 44, to attend to Ng. Toh was also a customer acquisition officer, whose job was to call potential customers to take personal loans from OCBC Bank.
Toh looked at the payslips that Ng provided and told him that he could apply for a maximum loan of $82,000. Ng agreed to borrow the maximum amount. The loan application form falsely stated that Ng worked as an engineer for CGGVeritas for 12 years.
After Ng had signed the loan application forms for OCBC Bank with Toh, another of Chua’s colleagues attended to him.
Edward Leong Wai Nam, 51, was also a customer acquisition officer. His job was to do tele-marketing for HSBC Bank.
Similarly, Leong looked at the payslips Ng provided and told him that he could apply for a maximum loan of $83,000. Ng agreed to borrow the maximum amount. In the loan application form, Ng similarly lied that he worked as an engineer for CGGVeritas for 12 years.
On 21 September, after the OCBC loan application was approved, Ng withdrew $81,000 in cash and passed Chua $16,000.
On 24 September, Ng withdrew $60,000 from HSBC Bank and passed Chua $16,000.
On 2 October, OCBC staff discovered during employment checks with CGGVeritas that Ng had submitted a fraudulent application for his personal loan. The company said he was not on its payroll. The payslips that Ng submitted to the bank also had a different format from the company’s genuine payslips.
An OCBC staff made a police report about the matter two days later.
HSBC also discovered the fraud and froze Ng’s account, retaining the balance of the personal loan amounting to $22,912.07.
Ng has not made any restitution while Chua has yet to be dealt with.
For each of his proceeded cheating charges, Ng could have been jailed for up to 10 years and also fined.
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