Employee took $140,000 in overpayment for overtime, holiday and sick pay
The District Court of New South Wales has recently sentenced a senior employee to a three-year term of imprisonment following fraudulent activity, including paying herself overtime when not eligible.
In its defence, the worker submitted evidence to the Court that she was a person of prior good character throughout her employment.
‘Essentially unsupervised’ for accounting payments
The case noted that the worker was a financial controller of the company with the responsibility for the payment of wages to all employees.
The worker was also tasked with other accounting payments required for the company. “She was essentially unsupervised, and the accounts were, for all practical purposes, unaudited,” the Court noted.
The employer argued that repeatedly, from July 2010 to December 2015, the worker intentionally overpaid herself regularly.
It argued that the worker had been employed from May 2007 on a salary of $90,000 per annum plus superannuation.
The employer noted that no pay increase had ever been approved by the company during the entire duration of the worker’s employment.
“Following the departure of the offender from her employment with the company in late 2015, a reprinting of the fortnightly payslips during the identified period between July 2010 and December 2015 disclosed, on the face of the payslips, overpayments to [the worker] in excess of the asserted base salary of $90,000,” the case stated.
Some of the pay slips also included amounts that were paid for the alleged overtime of the worker which, according to the employer, was a factor for the worker’s dishonest and fraudulent activity since the worker had been employed on a salary, not wages, and accordingly no overtime at all was payable by the employer.
The employer also said that the worker cashed out purported entitlements to holiday pay which had allegedly been accrued all without the approval of the employer.
“In addition to these three identified specific factors, there were alleged overpayments of superannuation which had been calculated on the inflated base salary,” the Court stated.
Worker expresses no remorse
Despite the employer’s contentions, the worker expressed no remorse and denied all claims against her in the course of her evidence.
Other than defending herself that she was a person of prior good character, the worker had little to no evidence about her background, including any psychological or other assessment, throughout the trial.
HRD previously reported an unfair dismissal case of a worker who was terminated for alleged misuse of the CEO’s digital signature, among other allegations of misconduct.
The employer argued that the worker’s lapse of judgement, which also involved the application of grants, amounted to fraud and serious misconduct, which ultimately warranted the worker’s dismissal.
Guilty verdict
After examining the case, the jury found the worker guilty in relation to 78 counts of having, by deception, dishonestly gained a financial advantage from her former company for around four and a half years.
Hence, as there is no other appropriate penalty, the worker was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 3 years.
Ultimately, the Court found that the gross amount of the overpayment of the worker amounted to over $140,000 between August 2011 to October 2015, which included overpayments from holiday/sick pay on top of her base salary.
