reprinted from:

An accomplice submitted false claims for GST rebates, purportedly for jewelry bought by tourists, and Customs officers Cheah Chee Khan, 30, and Loh How Cheh, 29, endorsed the claims. For each $10,000 false GST claim they approved, Cheah and Loh earned $200 each.

Between July and October last year, they endorsed 96 such cheques. This is believed to be the first time such a scam has come to light here.

Yesterday, both men pleaded guilty to 20 charges of cheating and two charges of corruption. They were jailed for six years each. They also have to pay a penalty of $1,000 each, which was what they had been paid.

District Judge Syed Alwee took 79 other similar charges into consideration. In June last year, Cheah and Loh met someone known to them as Ganapathi, and they devised a way to claim GST refunds using stolen global-refund cheques.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Raymond Fong told the court how it worked:

Last April, Cisco officer Nagarajan Ramaya, 31, stole 115 global-refund cheques from Soon Huat Goldsmith in Serangoon Road where he was on duty. He made out the cheques for fictitious sales of jewellery, and passed them to Ganapathi.

The latter arranged to meet either Loh and Cheah at the Customs and Excise GST-refund counter in the transit lounge of Changi Airport Terminal 2. He passed the stolen refund cheques to them, and Loh and Cheah endorsed the cheques so he could claim GST refunds.

The refund counter processes GST refunds for tourists. It is run by Singapore Global Refund, under contract from the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore. The counter paid out a total of $118,914.

In November, Mr Lew Chee Beng, 51, who owns the goldsmith shop from which the refund cheques were stolen, reported discrepancies between its monthly sales and the GST claims made.

The police then traced the cheques to Nagarajan, Loh and Cheah. Nagarajan was jailed for 57 months in April for stealing the refund cheques, and forging them.

Ganapathi is still at large.