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PM staffers accused of racking up credit from businesses without authorisation
Kaieteur News – Several small business owners are accusing staffers attached to the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) of using the department’s name to acquire items on credit and later refusing to pay for the goods.
Office of the Prime Minister
Three small businesses that retail computer parts and other office supplies confirmed to this publication that staffers from the OPM have outstanding payments for items taken on line of credit.
A female manager from one of the entities, who provided details on the issue, told Kaieteur News that OPM staffers were regular customers of the business until they started to refuse to settle their bill.
“What would happen is that staffers from the Information Technology Department of OPM usually procure items from the business. They would usually come and collect quotation for the Office of the Prime Minister. At first everything goes good with payment, but as they develop a relationship with you, over time, so they would come and collect items on credit,” the store employee said.
The woman explained that as the OPM staffers gained the trust of the store owners/managers, they would take items on credit.
“Sometimes they call and say they need something urgently for the Office of the Prime Minister and they people from accounts are not available to sign off on the purchase order and we would give them the items.”
The woman said, however, that months would go by with no word from the OPM on the items that were procured.
“Months would pass and I would send multiple copies of invoices and remind the office and their excuse is, the accounts department lost the documents or the process has to start over,” she said.
And sometimes, she said, the issue would occur for an entire year. “Right now we have outstanding payment since 2021, over $400,000 outstanding between 2021 and earlier this year. They just stop paying and stop coming,” she added.
“So when we called the Office of the Prime Minister, the Accounts Manager knows nothing of the items and there is no documentation despite us sending copies multiple times,” she said.
The store manager said at this point, the business may never get paid for the items but at least she wants to warn unsuspecting business owners not to fall into a similar trap.
She explained, “People may want to know why we give credit without documentation, so initially, the payment is fine and then they would come in and say they need something right away for the Prime Minister and no one was there to sign off the purchase order that they will bring it back, that’s how it starts. Then they would say, they will just collect the invoice to submit it for payment but that’s when we keep waiting and waiting.”
“We are just trying to prevent it from happening to someone else,” she added.
When Kaieteur News reached out to the OPM for a comment, this publication was told that only the Permanent Secretary (PS) was authorised to speak on such matters. However, all calls to the PS went unanswered.
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