NRI woman jailed for overtime scam

LONDON: A 22-year-old woman postal employee from Punjab, who was to fly to India to get married next month, has been jailed for a year on charges of making false overtime claim of 40,000 pounds from Royal Mail.

Mandish Kaur, a resident of Wilford Grove, worked at the Beeston office of the Royal Mail, the national postal service of the UK.

"The fact that you have made arrangements to go to India and get married after you were exposed indicates to me that you simply do not understand how serious what you have done is," Nottingham court judge Philip Head said while sentencing her for the false claim.

Between December 2004 and November 2006, Kaur filled overtime forms for weekends that she had not worked, claiming a total of 40,461 pounds from Royal Mail.

When challenged by her bosses in November, she denied it but went on to fill in another false claim, just days later.

Kaur, who started working for Royal Mail in October 2004, was eventually sacked in April this year.

Kaur wept when the judge pronounced the verdict against her. She said most of the money had gone on repaying debts of the family business.

"Royal Mail has changed its procedures for claiming overtime and it was as a result of these changes that this fraud came to light. We have a zero-tolerance approach to any dishonesty and that stance is shared by the overwhelming majority of postmen and women," a spokesman for Royal Mail told Nottingham Evening Post.

Source: timesofindia.indiatimes.com