Social Security Institute uncovers large-scale fraud scheme

Experts from the capital's territorial division of the National Social Security Institute Institute (NSSI) have uncovered the largest fraudulent scheme in the country to drain the Pension Fund, the institute said in its latest newsletter on December 16.

The fraud attempts involved forged documents from closed businesses, dozens of people being appointed to the same job, and signing employment contracts with deceased persons, the NSSI said.

The scheme has been uncovered as a result of checks carried out by the capital's territorial division of NSSI and by an investigation carried out by the Ministry of Interior and the National Investigation Service, following a report submitted to the Prosecutor's office.

The funds were siphoned off by using inauthentic certification documents for length of work experience and income issued by the state firm "Stroymashinzhenering".

A "suitable" employer to pay social security contributions was chosen - a state-owned company in bankruptcy since 1997, which was wound up in 2012 and declared itself the legal successor of another state-owned company, Transtehnika, established in 1989 and the legal successor of the “Vagonostroene” economic association, which included several plants.

In this way, Stroymashinzhenering was ostensibly entitled to keep the payrolls of the Vagonostroene and Transtechnika and their constituent plants and divisions for the period from 1982 to 1999.

After the company was wound up, the payrolls of the above-mentioned employers paying social security were handed over by an individual to the Social Insurance Archive of the NSSI. It was subsequently established, by means of graphological examinations, that the signatures of many of the workers appearing on the pay slips were not authentic and that those whose signatures were confirmed as authentic had in fact worked for another employer, as shown by documents which had not been produced in the pension proceedings.

The experts of the NSSI have also identified employers which have submitted notifications of concluded employment contracts with many employees with salaries equal to or close to the maximum social security income for the respective year, without having paid social security contributions, or employers that have employed persons for a short period of time and then submitted applications for unemployment benefits.