Daniel Ong’s Sister & Former Director of Twelve Cupcakes Admitted She Allowed the Firm to Underpay Its Workers

By
Shawn Ambrose
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A few years ago, Twelve Cupcakes was just that place that sold pretty cupcakes.

Now, the cupcakery brings to mind misdeeds, illicit activities, and more misdeeds.

Earlier this year, both co-founders of the cupcake chain, Daniel Ong and Jamie Teo, were fined for failing to prevent the company from underpaying its foreign workers.

Now, it turns out that Ong’s sister was involved as well.

Daniel Ong’s Sister & Former Director of Twelve Cupcakes Admitted She Allowed the Firm to Underpay Its Workers

In 2012, Twelve Cupcakes decided to expand its business by employing foreign workers.

Its directors, including Yvonne Ong Hwee Ming, were tasked with deciding how much they would be paid.

Fast forward nine years and Yvonne admitted in court that she allowed the company to underpay its workers.

As a result, the 49-year-old woman was fined $20,000 yesterday (27 July) after pleading guilty to four charges under the Employment of Foreign Manpower Act involving nearly $20,000.

Another four charges were taken into consideration.

Her offences were committed in 2013 and 2014, after which she left the business.

What Happened

Between 2013 and 2016, the firm had underpaid seven foreign workers, namely four customer service executives, two sales executives, and a pastry chef.

In the case of the pastry chef, he was supposed to receive monthly wages of $2,300 in 2014, but received only $1,600. He continued to received this lower sum until mid-2016.

The promised monthly salaries of the other underpaid employees had ranged from S$2,200 to S$2,600, but they received only around S$1,400 to S$2,050.

Even after the firm was sold to Kolkata-based Dhunseri Group for S$2.5 million in 2016, the foreign employees continued to be underpaid.

Six of them, the ones working in customer service and sales roles, were underpaid from December 2016 to September 2018.

One of them was also underpaid their October and November 2018 wages.

The pastry chef was once again underpaid his fixed monthly salary from January 2017 to September 2018.

To know more about the various work passes for foreigners in Singapore, watch this video to the end:

Both Co-founders Fined $65k

Earlier this year, Ong and Teo were fined $65,000 each for failing to prevent Twelve Cupcakes from underpaying its foreign workers.

Ong pleaded guilty to 10 charges under the Employment of Foreign Manpower Act, and Teo admitted to 10 similar charges.

As for Yvonne’s charges, it was specifically linked to the pastry chef and a sales executive.

She has since made $3,500 in restitution to the pastry chef, but the sales executive left Singapore in June 2019 and could not be located.

Under its new owner, the firm was fined an additional $119,500 for the same charges in Jan this year.

Ong claimed he wasn’t aware of the offences, as he “signed documents without a second glance”.

Teo, too, claimed the same thing.

Changed Tactics to Avoid Detection

Someone in the company certainly must have known about the underpaying, however, as the firm deliberately changed tactics to avoid detection.

Initially, Twelve Cupcakes credited the slashed salaries to the employees’ bank accounts.

But then the company tried something a little more devious.

Instead of underpaying them immediately, the workers were paid their full salary from May 2018 onwards.

The company later told the employees they had to return a portion of the money to the company.

Ministry of Manpower prosecutor Maximilian Chew asserted that if their offences hadn’t come to light, the company would have continued to underpay the workers.

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Featured Image: Twelve Cupcakes

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Shawn Ambrose
Email: [email protected]