Jail for ex-hair salon worker who spent over S$1,000 of customers’ CDC vouchers on herself

According to court documents, a 60-year-old woman visited the salon for a hair treatment on Aug 1, 2025. While she was deciding on a treatment plan, she handed her phone to Phang to help set up Shopee instalment payments.

While setting up payment, Phang accessed the woman’s text messages, found her CDC voucher redemption link and forwarded it to her own mobile phone.

Between Aug 1 and Aug 3, 2025, Phang accessed the redemption link and used the vouchers in nine transactions at various merchants, including NTUC FairPrice, Sheng Siong, an optical shop, a department store and food outlets. She spent a total of S$575.

The victim discovered the unauthorised use of her vouchers and lodged a police report on Aug 4, 2025.

Phang did not make restitution to this customer.

In a separate case, a 31-year-old woman handed her phone to Phang on Aug 9, 2025 for help setting up payment through the Atome app.

Similarly, Phang accessed the customer’s text messages and forwarded the redemption link to her own phone.

She used the vouchers between Aug 9 and Aug 11, 2025, spending S$592 across seven transactions. These were at a salon, NTUC FairPrice, Sheng Siong, Venus Beauty and a department store.

The victim reported the unauthorised transactions to the police on Sep 2, 2025.

Court documents stated that Phang made voluntary restitution of S$200 to this victim.

The prosecution argued for Phang to be jailed for between six and eight weeks, and for compensation to be paid to both victims, equivalent to the outstanding amounts after the voluntary restitution. The judge agreed.

“The accused was specifically entrusted with customers’ phones to help them set up payment methods on their respective phones,” Deputy Public Prosecutor Ronnie Ang said.

“The accused exploited the trust placed in her and misused it for wrongful access to the victims’ CDC vouchers.”

For the charge under the Computer Misuse Act, Phang could have been jailed for up to 10 years, or fined up to S$50,000, or both.

For criminal breach of trust, she could have been jailed for up to seven years, or fined, or both.