3 stores investigated for potential fraud in government co-payment scheme

Officials are investigating 3 businesses for possibly de-frauding the government under the “Let’s Go Halves” stimulus scheme introduced last month. The co-payment plan launched on October 16 in an effort to boost domestic spending. Under the scheme, 10 million citizens can avail of discounts on purchases at participating stores of up to 150 baht a day, capped at 3,000 baht per person.

Participating businesses receive the remainder of the purchase price from the government through the Thung Ngern app. However, it’s believed 3 businesses have already accessed funds through the app, without any purchases being made in their stores. Utthaphol Utthaworadet from the Fiscal Policy Office says an investigation has been launched into the stores in question.

“We have found that the merchants have withdrawn money via the application but have no actual purchases made at their shops since the campaign started. The office is currently gathering data from other merchants who might have been running similar ploys and will ask police to investigate them as well.

“We would like to warn merchants or customers who plan to use this campaign for purposes other than stimulating the economy to stop, as the Finance Ministry and Krung Thai Bank can check and verify each store’s purchase history.”

Despite the alleged fraud, Utthaphol says there are no plans to stop the stimulus scheme, which has given domestic spending a much-needed boost.

“The campaign will continue as planned, despite fraudulent attempts, as there have been more than 400,000 merchants registered, and total spending under the campaign has surpassed 5 billion baht.”

SOURCE: Nation Thailand