SINGAPORE: To hit his sales target, a wealth planning manager at DBS Bank forged his clients’ bank statements so that the insurance policies he was selling to them could take effect.
On Thursday (April 9), Vijendren Tanapal, 38, was sentenced to seven weeks’ jail after he pleaded guilty to two forgery charges involving two Japanese clients.
Several other similar charges linked to his other Japanese clients were considered during his sentencing.
Vijendren, a Singaporean, is no longer working for the bank, according to court documents.
As part of his job, Vijendren had been tasked to sell Manulife insurance policies, primarily targeting Japanese clients.
At the time of his offences in 2017, Japanese customers who wanted to buy an insurance policy with Manulife had to prove that they were not living in Japan.
Among other eligibility criteria, applicants had to prove that they had been living outside Japan for at least three years before the date of the policy’s purchase.
This requirement was to ensure that Manulife would not inadvertently contravene Japanese regulations in offering insurance products to the country’s residents.
Applicants could submit their bank statements as supporting documents.
They also had to sign an “attestation form”, stating that they had been living in another country for the past three years.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Gladys Lim said: “(Vijendren told) these clients that they could purchase the insurance policy as long as they would be in Singapore for three years, instead of having been in Singapore for the past three years, despite knowing that this was not Manulife’s requirement.
“The accused misrepresented this to his clients as he knew that they would not otherwise sign on the attestation form.”
To provide “proof” that his clients had fulfilled that requirement, Vijendren downloaded their DBS bank statements from its internal platform between May and October 2017.
After that, he used a software program to edit the year of his clients’ bank statements, before sending them to Manulife, along with the attestation forms that the clients had signed.
In January 2022, police received information from DBS that Vijendren had submitted multiple sets of forged documents linked to six Japanese clients.
He was later charged in court in 2026.
“There is no discernible monetary loss to DBS that may be attributable to the sale of Manulife insurance policies,” said the prosecutor.
Vijendren’s bail was set at S$15,000 on April 9, and he is expected to begin serving his sentence on July 31. - The Straits Times/ANN
