A Stirling University employee used a work credit card without permission to fraudulently obtain goods and services worth over £7000.
The fraud charge, to which 43-year-old Alex Lee had pleaded guilty, stated that she carried out the fraud between August 1, 2019 and January 31, 2020 by pretending to various companies, businesses and retailers that she was the authorised holder of the credit card, inducing them to provide her with goods and services to the value of £7500.
The locations of the frauds were given as the Allanwater Cafe, Bridge of Allan, and train journeys between her Barrhead address and Stirling University.
Fiscal depute Robbie McDougall told Stirling Sheriff Court on Wednesday that a manager at the University of Stirling had been made aware that the accused had made several unauthorised transactions on a work credit card over a number of months.
Following an initial investigation, a list of 132 transactions was produced totalling more than £7000.
After the matters came to light, Mr McDougall said, Lee had gone off sick from work and handed in her resignation.
The transactions related to items which were “clearly for Lee’s personal use”, the fiscal depute added, including grocery shopping, hotel bookings, alcohol and food takeaways
Police traced Lee at her Barrhead address in October last year, and the nature of the investigation explained to her.
She was arrested, but made no reply to caution. When she was later interviewed, said the fiscal depute, “she made full admissions to having used the card fraudulently”.
Sheriff Francis Gill told Lee, who was representing herself, she had pleaded guilty to a charge involving a significant sum of money and deferred sentence until February 16 for a criminal justice social work report.
