IN 2010, A SENSATIONAL CRIME made the newspaper headlines for being the first instance in Singapore where an insurance agent sold a non-existent policy. This sensational case involved the sale of a fake policy by an ex-AIA insurance agent to an Indonesian businessman with premiums costing US$5 million.
Sally Low Ai Ming used to be an AIA insurance agent. She rose through the ranks to be one of the top agents, making it to the Top of the Table (TOT), the highest honour among Million Dollar Round Table agents. She had even been featured in The Sunday Times in March 2001 and was among the youngest agents in the world to be considered a TOT agent.
In 2000, she got to know Enny Ariandini Pramana (aged 71), the wife of Indonesian businessman Ong Han Ling, who soon became her client. From that time on, Low sold Enny several policies and soon became a trusted agent. According to Mr Ong, she often visited them in their home on Scotts Road.
In 2002, Low told Mr Ong about a new policy, called the “AIA Thank You Policy” that was offered only to a select group of clients. In order to take up this policy, Mr Ong had to pay a premium of US$5 million, of which US$3.3 million comprised a US-dollar component and S$3 million was for a Singapore-dollar component. Mr Ong made the premium payment to AIA via telegraphic transfers in November 2002.
The policy was supposed to have a maturity payment after five years. The payout included annual fixed returns of 6 per cent for the US-dollar component and 7 per cent for the Singapore-dollar component. This would have worked out to a maturity value of about US$4.95 million for the US-dollar component and S$4.5 million for the Singapore-dollar component.
As part of her scam to sell Mr Ong a fake policy, Low also falsified official forms and forged documents. After making the payment for the AIA Thank You Policy, Mr Ong was said to have received three fake policy documents from Low as confirmation that the policy application had been approved.
However, without Mr Ong's knowledge, Low had used that premium payment made out to AIA to purchase four policies in Mr Ong and his wife’s names. She had submitted forged documents to AIA in order to purchase those policies.
In January 2005, Low told Mr Ong that two computer errors at AIA led to the issuance of a policy that was erroneously taken out under his name. In actuality, there were no computer errors. She then informed Mr Ong that in order for him not to lose his money, he had to assist in the surrender of the erroneous policy.
The plan was for AIA to issue Mr Ong a cheque for S$6.18 million. Mr Ong then had to repay the principal sum of S$5.3 million to AIA. For his efforts, he could keep the profit of S$887,000, which was supposedly the amount of profit AIA would have made from the policy.
However, unlike the initial premium payment, the sum of S$5.3 million was not to be paid out to AIA, but to Ms Low. This was a highly unusual practice. Initially, Mr Ong was reluctant to go ahead with this instruction but Low reassured him that she was authorised by her company to collect the money. She even produced a letter signed by Mark O’Dell, the general manager of AIA at that time, stating that she could collect the money on behalf of the insurer. Hence reassured, Mr Ong issued a cheque to Low.
In September 2006, Low used the same ploy again. She informed Mr Ong of yet another computer glitch that led to two policies being taken out in Enny’s name. Like the previous occasion, she told him to make payments in the same way and gave him another signed document by Mr O’Dell as proof of her authority to receive payment on behalf of AIA. Mr Ong then transferred additional sums of US$1 million and S$1 million to Low.
It was only in early 2008, that Low’s deception was finally discovered. In December 2007, just before the maturity payouts were due for the fake AIA Thank You Policy, Low produced a letter signed by Mr Edmund Tse, Chairman and CEO of AIA. In the letter, Mr Ong was asked if he wanted to use the proceeds from the first AIA Thank You Policy and reinvest them in a new AIA Thank You 3 Policy. This however required an additional single-premium payout of US$8 million.
Unable to raise the money in such a short time, Mr Ong then contacted AIA directly with the intent of asking for additional time to raise the premium amount. AIA then informed Mr Ong in January 2008 that the Thank You Policies were in fact, non-existent.
Instead, it was discovered that of the four policies Low took out in Mr Ong and his wife’s names, three were policies that Low had tricked them into surrendering in 2005 and 2006, the very same ones that were supposedly a result of the computer glitches.
The surrender amounts of about US$5.29 million, US$1 million and S$1 million had been delivered to Low. She transferred the money to a bank account of a company registered in the British Virgin Islands with the beneficiary of the account being Low, herself. The proceeds were also to pay the down payment for a Sentosa Cove condo.
After Mr Ong contacted AIA, the insurer suspected that Low had cheated Mr Ong and made a police report. In September 2009, Low was sacked by AIA and declared a bankrupt.
In May 2011, Sally Low Ai Ming was charged and the Subordinate Court initially set bail at $2 million. As she did not raise the cash, she was remanded at Changi Women’s Prison. Subsequently, she requested for bail to be reduced and it was revised to $300,000 on the condition that Low surrendered her passport and reported weekly to authorities.
In December 2013, Low pleaded guilty to four of the 19 charges involving fake US$5.6 million policy – the remainder of the 15 charges will be taken into consideration during her sentencing. Of the charges, four were for cheating, 11 for the fraudulent use of forged documents and four for moving crime proceeds to bank accounts and to partially pay for a property.
At the time of writing, sentencing for Low had not yet been announced.
Besides the 19 charges brought against Low, she also faced a civil suit from Mr Ong who alleged that she used the premium for the “Thank You” policy to buy four AIA plans under his name and that of his wife without their knowledge.
He is suing Low for about $3.6 million (outstanding amount due under the policies taken under Mr Ong’s name minus the amount that Low had paid back to Mr Ong), plus the loss of use of his funds. In March 2010, Mr Ong’s lawyers had obtained an injunction to freeze Low’s assets which included proceeds from the sale of a condominium in Cairnhill and funds in several bank accounts in Singapore and Indonesia.
Low however, is counterclaiming that she was merely an accomplice in an elaborate ploy by Mr Ong to defraud AIA. She said that she had approached Mr Ong to buy more policies in 2002 so that she could become a top agent but that he had devised a plan to defraud AIA and share the spoils.
Low’s story implicates Mr Ong as the mastermind behind the scam. The plan was for her to sell Mr Ong the non-existent Thank You policies. Upon “maturity” of these policies, Mr Ong would then query about the payments and once the deception was uncovered, it was hoped that AIA would then make restitution to Mr Ong for his losses.
She also claimed that the idea for the computer glitches were Mr Ong’s, as was the plan to transfer the money to her, to allay suspicions that proceeds from the surrender of the policies were going to him.
According to Low, she regretted her part in the scam and had asked Mr Ong to let her invest some of the money to try and make back the returns that would have been due to him but was unable to do so because of the recession.