{"id":222499,"date":"2022-04-20T16:04:54","date_gmt":"2022-04-20T14:04:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/duo-in-hot-water-over-covid-19-ters-fraud\/"},"modified":"2022-04-20T16:04:54","modified_gmt":"2022-04-20T14:04:54","slug":"duo-in-hot-water-over-covid-19-ters-fraud","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/duo-in-hot-water-over-covid-19-ters-fraud\/","title":{"rendered":"Duo in hot water over COVID-19 TERS fraud"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sanews.gov.za\/sites\/default\/files\/2012\/images\/newsstorytemplate\/202204\/prisonbars.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<p>Two directors of an engineering company have been arrested for allegedly defrauding the COVID-19 Temporary Employer-Employee Relief Scheme (TERS) of R648&nbsp;000.<\/p>\n<p>The Pusoloso Engineering Services duo have had their bank accounts frozen and a forfeiture process is currently underway to recover the money allegedly stolen.<\/p>\n<p>Between August 2020 and March 2021, the two suspects are alleged to have deceitfully applied for COVID-19 TERS benefits for 95 people who were not their employees, without their knowledge and consent.<\/p>\n<p>In a statement on Wednesday, the Department of Employment and Labour said the company directors subsequently received R648&nbsp;915.<\/p>\n<p>The department\u2019s Risk Management officials in Gauteng started an investigation after some employees applied for normal unemployment benefits, but their ID numbers revealed that they were included in a COVID-19 TERS application by the two directors.<\/p>\n<p>A fraud case was opened and joint investigations by the Risk Management officials and the police led to the arrest of the suspects on 11 April 2022 in Berea, Gauteng.<\/p>\n<p>The two have been granted bail in the Palm Ridge Specialised Commercial Crimes Court and the matter has been postponed to 3 June 2022.<\/p>\n<p>Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) Commissioner, Teboho Maruping, applauded the Risk Management officials and police for their collaborative efforts in apprehending the suspects.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe net is seriously closing in on fraudsters and I hope these latest arrests serve as a strong message and warning to other would-be fraudsters. Two weeks ago, another suspect was arrested in KwaZulu-Natal for allegedly defrauding the UIF of R1 million and I am truly grateful to our Risk Management officials and law enforcement agencies for their great work in bringing these and other suspects to justice,&#8221; Maruping said.<\/p>\n<p>According to the department, at least 22 suspects have been arrested for COVID-19 TERS related fraud and more arrests are imminent. \u2013<strong>SAnews.gov.za<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Two directors of an engineering company have been arrested for allegedly defrauding the COVID-19 Temporary Employer-Employee Relief Scheme (TERS) of R648&nbsp;000. The Pusoloso Engineering Services duo have had their bank accounts frozen and a forfeiture process is currently underway to recover the money allegedly stolen. Between August 2020 and March 2021, the two suspects are [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":222500,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[38678],"class_list":{"0":"post-222499","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-south-africa","8":"tag-sanews","9":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/duo-in-hot-water-over-covid-19-ters-fraud.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222499\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}