Now, why is this happening?

A few weeks back, one of the applicants to our fund (she comes from another state) informed me that her vet had written a higher amount on the receipt “so that she could claim more” from us. As you know, our subsidy for medical treatment is based on how much is written on the bill.

Initially, she thought it was very “clever” of her vet to do that (so that she could claim more from us), but when I pointed out that it was blatant dishonesty, she said her vet was a very confused person. Then I asked why she had not pointed out the mistake to her (confused) vet. On this, she defended her vet and said it is all up to her vet to write whatever the vet wanted and she had no right to question it.

Yes, her defence story kept changing.

So, I suppose as decent human beings, when we see a mistake being made, we just let it be? What if we are paying for our purchases at the supermarket and the cashier gives us excess change? We just take it because that was what the cashier gave us?

We have since banned that applicant and should we receive any claims with receipts from that clinic, we shall check it thoroughly. If in doubt, we will not subsidise.

And recently, we had another application where the vet also wrote a higher amount than what was charged. We are not subsidising this case as the applicant does not qualify to apply and we also found out that the bill had already been paid for by another donor. We have noted the name of the vet’s clinic as well. Like the applicant above, this applicant also said we should not be questioning what the vet writes.

Sorry, I beg to differ on this. We have to, because every sen from our funds is hard-earned and given based on trust from our donors and in turn, we disburse the funds based on trust. The amount disbursed is calculated based on the receipt. How can we give out more than what was charged?

I’m perplexed why vets write a higher amount than what is charged.

Isn’t that dishonesty?

I remember we had, in the past, subsidised bills from the clinic before, and it was submitted by regular applicants whose honesty we do not doubt. So, we wrote to them and asked if this vet had ever written a higher amount than what was paid for. Both applicants said no. What was written was the exact amount charged.

So, is it the vets being “confused” or maybe it has nothing to do with any “confusion” at all?

But wait…the story has not ended.

The first case continues….

So, we told the applicant that she is barred from further claims. She had nothing to say because she was guilty as charged. But what do you know, the next day, we received a claim from a brand new applicant asking if we could subsidise the spaying of this certain dog. Her email sounded suspiciously familiar and the photo of the dog was even more familiar!

Yes, you guessed it, the photo was taken with the same camera (there are softwares to check these things out). Giving this “new applicant” the benefit of the doubt, I still replied and asked for her location.

There was no reply from her after that. No news is good news.

Was it the same defaulted applicant putting in a fresh application under a fictitious name, or did she ask her friend to write in to claim from us?

We’d never know, but thankfully, “the sky has eyes”, the Universe intervened, and we have not heard from both ever since!

So, as I always tell people who say they can find ways to cheat us: Yes, you can cheat us and cheat the whole world, but you can never cheat yourself. So, may you sleep well at night.