Thread: Thai Worker Scams Harrods In London

By Agency10:03AM BST 06 Aug 2015


A Harrods worker who accumulated £280,000 of loyalty card points when customers failed to collect them has been spared jail.

Chomchanok Hongsakuulvasu, 28, wept in the dock as she admitted a three-year scam to accrue nearly 850,000 Reward Card points to spend at the luxury Knightsbridge store.

The points would have been worth almost £3,000 to spend in-store.

While working in the Export Bureau Department, the Thai national scanned the receipts on to her own loyalty card when customers did not want them.


She started the scam in 2013, collecting 2,495 points, and remained undetected for so long that by 2015 she had collected nearly 850,000 points.

Hammersmith Magistrates' Court heard the points would have cost more than £280,000 to collect legally.


Harrods bosses eventually rumbled the fraud when Hongsakuulvasu purchased items and it was noticed she had an abnormal amount of points on a loyalty card registered under a variation of her name.

Hongsakuulvasu, who was supported in court by her fianc, broke down in tears as she pleaded guilty to fraud by false representation.

She was given a 16-week jail sentence suspended for a year and ordered to pay compensation of £7,513.25 to Harrods.


District Judge Michael Snow said: 'You were employed by Harrods store as a member of the Export Bureau Department, and over a period of time, starting in 2013 and ending in 2015, you claimed customer reward points which should only have been allocated to the individual customers concerned.

'For the year 2015 you collected 751,355 points, which could only have been gained by spending a quarter of a million pounds.'


Hongsakuulvasu collected 96,951 points in 2014 which would have required a spend of £32,000, and in 2013 she collected 2495 points, the court heard.

Mr Snow said: 'An aggravating factor is the sheer scale of the points you have acquired by obtaining somehow the various receipts, and then going to your card and putting the information on the receipt onto your card.'


Hongsakuulvasu, who lives in southwest London, is in the UK on a working visa, and plans to leave the UK for Bangkok as soon as possible.

She was given also put on a curfew to be at her home address between 6pm and 6am, which will be monitored with an electronic tag.

She was ordered to pay £7,513.25 compensation to Harrods, 85 prosecution costs, a court charge of 180, and a victim surcharge of 80, all within a week.

telegraph.co.uk

Harrods worker stole £280,000 of loyalty card points - Telegraph

I think if they spelt her name differently.... they might have found her shop online selling very expensive handbags

https://instagram.com/miihong

She was ordered to pay £7,513.25 compensation to Harrods, 85 prosecution costs, a court charge of 180, and a victim surcharge of 80, all within a week.

.... But fucked off to the airport instead.

the Thai national scanned the receipts on to her own loyalty card when customers did not want them

Scam? Hardly. Harrod's were happy to cough up the money. She just picked it up instead of somebody who, according to the report, didn't want it. Fucking nonsense. I hope she goes back and drops a turd in the food hall.

She was given also put on a curfew to be at her home address between 6pm and 6am, which will be monitored with an electronic tag.

Jesus fucking Christ. What a fucking awful country.

What a load of bollocks, shops here where I spend money and I say I don't have "a card" the 1st thing that happens is the cashier puts her 'card' in its place instead.

Fuck you Harrods, I hope you go broke.

Originally Posted by Passing Through

the Thai national scanned the receipts on to her own loyalty card when customers did not want them

Scam? Hardly. Harrod's were happy to cough up the money. She just picked it up instead of somebody who, according to the report, didn't want it. Fucking nonsense. I hope she goes back and drops a turd in the food hall.

She was given also put on a curfew to be at her home address between 6pm and 6am, which will be monitored with an electronic tag.

Jesus fucking Christ. What a fucking awful country.

Too true... and they actually believe Labour would make it better.

Harrods is dirty foreign corner shop, nothing British about it.

Originally Posted by Passing Through

Scam? Hardly. Harrod's were happy to cough up the money. She just picked it up instead of somebody who, according to the report, didn't want it. Fucking nonsense. I hope she goes back and drops a turd in the food hall.

Exactly, it's damn hard to see who is the 'victim' of a crime here.

Harrods happily gives out the points, customer says they don't want them so enterprising girl picks them up.

Screw Harrod's, I'm cancelling my Xmas hamper order immediately!

A bit of a light sentence.

Who was her fiance? A punter from Patters?

Dirty Qataris, they think they're all posh now they've bought Harrods.

Harrods I am suspending My loyalty card , along with My shopping on line with your Arab owned store in protest.
I hope this story makes Private Eye.
Since the Royal emblem was taken down, standards have slipped.

Originally Posted by Black Heart

A bit of a light sentence.

Who was her fiance? A punter from Patters?

Shes a HiSo brat, but not HiSo enough to but all the trinkets she wanted it seems.

That this even got to court is fucking absurd, the lass showed a little entrepreneurial initiative and gets crucified, for what? No victim no crime.

Given this is the same harrods that fired an employee for only eating half her free lunch time sandwich and taking the other half home.... this is no more than you would expect from the spiv's

She could have said the customers tipped her for exceptional service.

Did the customers give her the points or did she take them if they forgot?

This is not a victimless crime, fraud costs companies billions, in fact she alone cost Harrods millions. She received exactly what she deserved re: sentencing, provided she doesn't skip the country.

Originally Posted by kingwilly

in fact she alone cost Harrods millions. She received exactly what she deserved re: sentencing, provided she doesn't skip the country.

How did she cost Harrods millions?

'For the year 2015 you collected 751,355 points, which could only have been gained by spending a quarter of a million pounds

Oops. Slight mmiscalculation. less than millions, but certainly pushing towards that number.

But start adding in the cost of additional measures, training and security needed for loss prevention. Sorry folks, pilfering or skimming costs billions and the costs are passed on. She's little better than a gyppo scammed.

Originally Posted by kingwilly

Oops. Slight mmiscalculation. less than millions, but certainly pushing towards that number.

But start adding in the cost of additional measures, training and security needed for loss prevention. Sorry folks, pilfering or skimming costs billions and the costs are passed on. She's little better than a gyppo scammed.

The points she stole were worth less than 3000 pounds. I have told you a million times to stop exaggerating.

Sorry folks, pilfering or skimming costs billions and the costs are passed on.

Gone from millions to billions now. Blimey.

Still, since her crime - such as it was - caused no loss to Harrods (other, perhaps, than whatever lost sales there might have been from customers not coming back to redeem the points which they willingly gave up), your squealing about costing Harrods millions is completely absurd.

She's little better than a gyppo scammed.

What a charmer you are.

Does she have a gambling habit? I mean she's Thai, innit.

Originally Posted by kingwilly

'For the year 2015 you collected 751,355 points, which could only have been gained by spending a quarter of a million pounds

Oops. Slight mmiscalculation. less than millions, but certainly pushing towards that number.

But start adding in the cost of additional measures, training and security needed for loss prevention. Sorry folks, pilfering or skimming costs billions and the costs are passed on. She's little better than a gyppo scammed.

I don't think wee willy understands.
She didn't skim or pilfer anything. And if she did it was from the customers to whom those points originally would have been allocated.
The quarter of a million Pounds mentioned is the amount that customers had ALREADY SPENT on goods to generate that amount of points. It is not how much she stood to gain.
The points value is NOT Pound for point and the redemption value of those points (did someone say 3000pound?) is calculated into the cost of sales. All she was doing was picking up what the customers hadn't claimed. Whether they didn't want them or forgot to claim them is irrelevant. They were as trash lying around that she found she could use.
I see no harm or cost to anyone here.

guilty to fraud by false representation.

For the year 2015 you collected 751,355 points, which could only have been gained by spending a quarter of a million pounds.

'An aggravating factor is the sheer scale of the points you have acquired by obtaining somehow the various receipts, and then going to your card and putting the information on the receipt onto your card.'

she is quite rightly being punished for her calculated fraud, for her dishonesty and for breaching the terms of her employment to which she agreed to when she accepted the job. those terms will have clearly stated that employees were not entitled to points not wanted by customers.

she is a sleazy dishonest cheat deserving of punishment and not the entrepreneurial genius as some seem to think and this has nothing to do with ones views on Harrods or its owners.

Originally Posted by taxexile

guilty to fraud by false representation.

For the year 2015 you collected 751,355 points, which could only have been gained by spending a quarter of a million pounds.

'An aggravating factor is the sheer scale of the points you have acquired by obtaining somehow the various receipts, and then going to your card and putting the information on the receipt onto your card.'

she is quite rightly being punished for her calculated fraud, for her dishonesty and for breaching the terms of her employment to which she agreed to when she accepted the job. those terms will have clearly stated that employees were not entitled to points not wanted by customers.

she is a sleazy dishonest cheat deserving of punishment and not the entrepreneurial genius as some seem to think and this has nothing to do with ones views on Harrods or its owners.

Except she didn't cheat anyone out of anything.
Just used other peoples unwanted or discarded for the purpose for which it was intended.

the purpose of the points is to reward customers for their loyalty to the store, she was neither a customer nor was she loyal.

by obtaining somehow the various receipts, and then going to your card and putting the information on the receipt onto your card.'

she was sly, devious and dishonest. she did not seek permission first.

^^ Quite. It's as ridiculous as charging people with theft when they're caught dumpster diving. But then some people can't walk past a boot without licking it and for them any infringement of the law, however arbitrary and absurd, is unthinkable.