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Case Studies
Storing up trouble
Calvin and David were employees of a department store. Calvin was a merchandiser while David, the warehouse supervisor, was responsible for verifying the goods received and performing regular stock-takes.
They were well acquainted with most of the suppliers, especially Mr. Wong and Mr. Au. Over the weekends, both Calvin and David liked playing mahjong games together with their suppliers. Although Calvin and David were not good at mahjong games, they often won a lot.
During a mahjong game, Calvin shared his worries over the heavy financial burden posed by his daughter who studied overseas while David echoed his difficulty regarding negative equity on his assets. Grasping the opportunity to ‘help’ Calvin and David while making extra money for themselves, Wong and Au proposed a scam to cheat the department store. They suggested Calvin overstating the amount of toiletries to be purchased from them and David stamping the official receipt chop on the invoices purporting that the received quantities were correct. As a reward, Wong and Au would offer a monthly commission of $10,000 each to Calvin and David.
Case Analysis
It would be an offence under Section 9 of the Prevention of Bribery Ordinance (POBO) for Calvin and David (as employees) to accept advantage (i.e. the $10,000 commission offered by Wong and Au) without the permission of their employer (i.e. the department store). Wong and Au might also commit an offence of offering bribes. Besides, by overstating the purchase orders and acknowledging the false receipt, both Calvin and David might breach Section 9(3) of the POBO which forbids the use of documents containing false, erroneous or defective information to deceive the employer.
Calvin and David should observe their company’s code of conduct guiding the employees’ relationship with persons having business dealings with their employer and thus avoiding frequent gambling with suppliers. Sometimes the advantages do not seem to be connected to their official duties at the time of offer, e.g. the winnings at mahjong games. However, acceptance of such advantages may lead to conflict of interest or an embarrassing or compromising situation which the recipients may be asked to return a favour.