Kee Kong holds up the police report. He is flanked by Huang (right) and Pak Cheng.
SIBU (June 22): A timber company has lodged a police report claiming its payroll was amended and a total of RM363,509 for its 73 staff was transferred to two unknown third party accounts.
Bintani Maju Sdn Bhd managing director Wong Kee Kong revealed the police report was lodged on June 4 and the company wants the bank to thoroughly investigate the matter.
“As the company representatives and being the victims, we will reserve our right to take further legal action,” he said during a Zoom press conference yesterday with company chairman Wong Pak Cheng and Repok assemblyman Datuk Seri Huang Tiong Sii.
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Kee Kong claimed that on June 3 at 9.28am, he made an online transfer of RM116,850 to 22 Bintani Maju accounts.
At 1.25pm the same day, he claimed he transferred another RM246,659 to 51 accounts under Greenpower Crystal Sdn Bhd.
“At about 3.30pm on June 4, we horribly realised that all the beneficiaries’ account numbers had been amended and processed to two unknown third party accounts without any notification,” he said.
He claimed RM116,850 was transferred to a third party account, while RM246,659 was transferred to another third party account.
Kee Kong claimed he immediately called the bank and requested it freeze the funds transferred to the two unknown accounts.
“On that same day, accompanied by one of the bank’s staff, we reported the incident to the police in detail regarding the whole fraud and were advised to wait for the bank’s investigation before they could take any further action,” he said.
According to Kee Kong, they also reported the matter to Bank Negara on June 7 and were advised to wait for the bank’s internal investigation.
“On June 17, we received the investigation report from the bank. In their investigation report, we noticed a negative outcome in which the standard of procedure for payroll file posting to the stage of approval were all in order and it seems like us, as a victim, needs to take full responsibility in this fraud,” he said.
Kee Kong said he was perplexed why such a transaction, where 51 and 22 payees had the same account number, did not trigger the bank’s security system before being processed.
He expressed disappointment that the bank failed to request the two other banks where the money ended up to freeze the funds and recover the money as soon as possible since they had raised the red flag to the bank concerned immediately after they realised the fraud.
He also queried why the bank would accept online transfers if the names and account numbers did not match.
Huang said the fraud would significantly affect the company’s business operations.
“I would like to emphasise that the negative effect will not only apply to this company but will also influence the confidence of all other bank users.
“Therefore I hope the bank can take it as an essential issue and extend an immediate thorough investigation on it in order to earn back the confidence of the bank users,” he added.