Hong Kong's pension fund regulator said it has identified suspicious cases involving claims for early withdrawal with suspected fraudulent medical certificates.
The watchdog received claims for early withdrawal of the Mandatory Provident Fund on the grounds of “terminal illness” or “total incapacity”, but later confirmed with the registered medical practitioners that those certificates were likely forged, said Ayesha Macpherson Lau, chairwoman of the Mandatory Provident Fund Schemes Authority.
The team referred the suspected cases to law enforcement agencies for follow-up and rejected the corresponding withdrawal claims, Lau wrote in her blog on Monday.
Lau highlighted that the centralization of all MPF administration tasks through eMPF facilitates the identification of potential connections among various claims, particularly those orchestrated by fraud syndicates across multiple MPF schemes.
Suspicious cases that were previously difficult to detect can now be identified and addressed at a much earlier stage and more effectively, the MPFA said, stressing that the regulator will verify every medical certificate received.
Over the past year, MPFA has proactively liaised with medical professional bodies in both the public and private sectors to explore ways to improve the verification mechanism for medical certificates, as well as to strengthen requirements regarding their content to reduce the risks of misuse or forgery, it said.
The watchdog, in partnership with the eMPF team, has established a dedicated task force to proactively improve prevention at source by reviewing the verification mechanism for early MPF withdrawal claims, and formulating a series of measures to strengthen prevention and deterrence against suspicious claims through a multi-pronged approach, involving regulation, operation and enforcement which include, it added.
