Harry's former director charged with 20 counts of false declaration of employees' salary

The former director and officer-in-charge of human resources at Harry's International Pte Ltd has been charged by the state court with 20 counts of making false salary declarations in the work pass applications of foreign employees.

Ms Parmjit Kaur, a Singaporean citizen, made the declarations to the Controller of Work Passes (Controller) between April 8 to Sep 2, 2013, said the Ministry of Manpower in a statement on Thursday (Nov 12).

Kaur, 48, is believed to have instructed her subordinates to declare that the fixed monthly salaries of foreign employees would be $3,100, so as to meet the salary requirement in order to obtain Employment Passes (EPs) for them.

Kaur allegedly knew that the 20 foreign employees would be paid less than what was declared in their work pass applications.

She was charged on Thursday with 20 counts for the offence of making false declarations to MOM in her capacity as a director and the officer-in-charge of human resources at the company.

If convicted, she could be fined $20,000 and/or jailed for up to two years.

The case against Kaur has been adjourned to Dec 10.

MOM had previously taken services-related businesses to task over false salary declarations.

In April 2014, the ministry charged eight employers who were franchisees of local convenience store 7-Eleven for making false declarations.

To date, the court has meted out fines ranging between $8,000 and $56,000 as penalty for the offences.

In November last year, MOM also prosecuted the director of Blue Diamond Restaurant Pte Ltd for making false declarations. The restaurant director was fined $32,000.

The ministry said that it is currently investigating other similar cases involving 241 foreigners hired by 95 employers.

wjeanne@sph.com.sg