Man wants free repair for damaged car, so he takes part in fake accident

SINGAPORE — A 43-year-old man agreed to take part in a scheme to engineer road accidents in Singapore — simply because he wanted to get his car, which had been damaged beforehand, repaired for free.

On Monday (June 3), Lum Chee Keat was convicted in the State Courts of conspiring with his ex-colleague, 42-year-old Jeffrey Yong Chee Meng, to cheat NTUC Income Insurance Co-operative.

The court heard that sometime in 2011, Yong noticed that Lum’s car was damaged and offered to get it repaired for free — by arranging to stage a traffic accident so that Lum could claim the insurance for the repairs.

Lum agreed and was given a few hundred dollars for handing his car, which was registered under his brother’s name, over to Yong.

On Oct 18, the fictitious accident took place along the Pan-Island Expressway towards Jurong,  involving Lum’s car, with him as the purported driver, and three other vehicles.

About a day or two later, Yong instructed Lum to make an accident report.

Yong described to Lum how the fictitious accident happened by drawing it out for him. He even told him how many vehicles were involved and what their plate numbers were.

With this information, Lum went down to an accident reporting centre and did as he was told. He then handed a copy of the accident statement to Yong.

On Dec 12 that year, GA Auto, which acted on behalf of Lum’s brother, submitted a letter of demand for a third party damage claim amounting to S$6,900 to NTUC Income, the insurer of one of the vehicles involved.

NTUC made a payout of S$6,500 on May 4, 2012, which Lum used to repair his car.

He has since made full restitution to NTUC.

HOW HE WAS CAUGHT

Yong also told Lum to see a doctor so that he could claim insurance for personal injuries.

Lum did as he was told and then instructed the law firm M/s Tan Leroy & Chandra to make a personal injury claim on his behalf.

On May 14, 2012, the law firm sent a letter of demand for S$7,534.05 to NTUC for Lum’s supposed injury that resulted from the fictitious accident.

Suspecting that the claim was fraudulent, NTUC did not make the payout this time.

On April 5, 2013, the ruse unravelled when MSIG Insurance, which insured one of the vehicles involved in the staged accident, reported what it suspected was a fraudulent insurance claim.

Investigations revealed that a syndicate in Singapore was involved in a scheme to engineer road accidents.

This syndicate recruited people who were willing to provide their vehicles or their particulars.

In return, they were promised a commission or free repairs to their damaged vehicles.

Lum will return to court to be sentenced on June 18.

For each charge of cheating, he is liable to be imprisoned for up to three years and/or fined.