A 37-year-old software developer in Singapore was fined S$5,000 (approximately Rs 3.2 lakh) for forging a medical certificate to take nine days of sick leave. The incident took place while Su Qin was working for ETC Singapore SEC Limited and applied for leave because of her family’s health issues, including herself and her sick mother. However, Qin, a citizen of China, was apprehensive about leaving a negative impression at work.
According to Channel News Asia, Qin had her reasons for not wanting the company to have a “bad impression” of her. In order to come up with an excuse to support her sickness, Qin had to forge a new medical certificate using Adobe Photoshop from an old one. She altered it to state St Luke’s Hospital and deleted the original hospitalisation dates, typed her desired leave period from March 23 to April 3, 2024, and dated the certificate as of the last day of March.
Additionally, she worked to make the QR code inconspicuous, hoping it would not be detected easily. After forging this particular document, she cashed S$3,541.15 while she was away. On April 4, Qin resigned from her position. However, when performing some standard checks, the head of the HR department identified the forgery because the QR code was blurred and led to a broken link, the media outlet reported.
When asked for the original certificate, Qin reportedly forged a new one with a different QR code and produced the second fake medical certificate on April 8. This prompted her employer to question her over the forgeries and she was fired within a period of 24 hours, Channel News Asia reported.
After getting dismissed from the company, the HR head registered a case against Qin to the police. It was also discovered that she had faked her mother’s death certificate to stay back in China as she looked after her critically ill mother.
Qin was eventually charged with one count of forgery with two other charges taken into consideration when passing the sentence, and was ordered to pay the court S$5,000. Her attorney therefore argued that she be released from custody because her actions were prompted by desperation, and she is the only breadwinner for her aged parents.
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