Staff Reporter –
The Hamilton District Court sentenced a Bay of Plenty man on April 22, 2015 to 10 months’ home detention on 16 charges of filing false PAYE tax returns.
Harjinder Singh was found guilty of using Inland Revenue Department (IRD) Numbers of backpackers and other tourists.
The Court heard that he had cheated IRD of more than $260,000, claiming that he had employed backpackers and tourists as temporary workers at his Kiwifruit farm.
The Department has recovered $262,458 owed by Singh.
High wages suspicion
IRD Group Manager (Investigations) Patrick Goggin said that the figures relating to wages supplied by Singh were higher than normal.
“He hired them as temporary workers but after they had moved jobs or left New Zealand, Singh continued to use their IRD numbers to put through portions of his permanent staff’s wages. Singh’s actions were selfish and posed a real risk. He logged some of the permanent staff’s wages under the IRD numbers of the temporary workers who no longer worked for him. This means, by using the wrong IRD numbers, Singh could have helped his permanent staff to defraud the system by effectively reducing their declared income. This could have led to staff members getting more family assistance tax credits than they were entitled to, or reducing the amount of child support they may have had to pay,” he said.
System misuse
Mr Goggin said that the defendant could have misused the numbers to employ and pay illegal immigrants.
The Department was alerted by some backpackers who expressed concern that they had been taxed on money that they had not earned.
“We acted quickly to stop Singh and help the additional 120 victims. We also identified whose IRD numbers were likely to have been misused. Where applicable, we have refunded any overpaid tax. IRD takes criminal activity like this seriously,” he said.
Identity protection
Mr Goggin said that they would always be a minority who would try and cheat honest taxpayers out of money that pays for services like our schools and hospitals.
“Some backpackers whose IRD numbers were ripped off are worried they will not be able to return to New Zealand due to Singh’s actions causing possible breaches to their work visa. IRD takes its responsibility of protecting customers’ identities from misuse seriously. It is important we all protect our IRD number the best we can and treat it with the same secrecy as our banking PIN number,” he said.
