Wage cheater: woman in China who held 16 jobs at once over 3 years, never went to work, used multiple incomes to buy villa snared by police

The story of a woman in China who fraudulently juggled separate jobs with 16 different companies simultaneously – amassing enough cash to buy a villa in Shanghai – has stunned mainland social media.

Wage cheater, Guan Yue’s scam came to an end when she was arrested during a job interview, a typical situation where she would take photos and share them on work group chats to trick her multiple employers into thinking that she was meeting with clients.

To keep track of her intricate racket, Guan kept detailed paper records of essential information, including start dates, job titles and bank account numbers for each of her positions.

The inveterate wage cheat never turned down potential job opportunities, and when overwhelmed, sold job offers to others and pocketed a commission.

Both Guan and her husband, Chen Qiang, were adept at exploiting rules and laws. A measure of their criminal skills is evidenced by the fact that Chen has initiated 13 arbitration cases and won them all.

Over a period of three years, the couple amassed sufficient wealth to afford a villa in the Baoshan district of Shanghai. It was not reported how much they paid for the property.

However, their nefarious scheme was exposed in January 2023 when one of the employers, tech company owner Liu Jian, discovered paperwork discrepancies.

In October 2022, the tech company hired a core team leader and seven other individuals, all of whom boasted impressive resumes and extensive experience.

However, despite the fact that the core leader got a monthly salary of 20,000 yuan (US$2,750) and the rest about half that, they failed to deliver results and had their contracts terminated.

It was shortly after this that Liu discovered the paperwork discrepancies and reported the matter to the police.

An investigation discovered a flow of dodgy funds listed as salaries, ranging from thousands to tens of thousands of yuan, into different bank accounts.

Eventually, 53 members of Guan’s wage cheating criminal group were arrested. The total amount involved in the case exceeded 50 million yuan (US$7 million).

According to police estimates, there are at least 700 to 800 wage cheaters across China.

One fraudster even had his girlfriend hold a real human resources director position in a company to help run their scam.

In another case, one wage-cheating syndicate tipped off a technology company that another criminal group had infiltrated their firm and then replaced the staff sacked with their own team of racketeers.

Mainland social media has been astonished at the scale of the problem.

Some also questioned the employment situation in China and urged a tightening of the rules and regulations governing hiring and firing.

One online observer said: “Even if only two out of the 16 companies had paid social security for their employees, the fraud would have been exposed much earlier.”

“These swindlers were only able to cheat less reputable companies. If these companies followed regulations and laws, the scammers would not have survived a single day,” said another.