KAIST Research Fund Card Used to Pay for Meals and Falsify Leaving Time... "Widespread Moral Hazard"

Ministry of Industry, 2023 Korea Electric Power Corporation University Audit Results
Irregularities Including Fraudulent Receipt of Overtime Pay Detected

Jeonnam Naju City Selected as an Innovation City. Photo by Naju City

Immoral practices such as misuse of corporate cards and false attendance by employees of Korea Energy Engineering University (KEEU) have been confirmed through an audit. Multiple cases were uncovered, including a professor who paid 1.27 million KRW for meals using corporate and research fund cards, and a team leader who fraudulently recorded working hours and received overtime pay.

On the 27th, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy announced the results of the 2023 audit of KEEU, highlighting these issues. This audit was conducted following calls for a thorough government investigation into problems and concealment suspicions revealed during a work consulting session held by the National Assembly in April, which reviewed KEEU’s operations since the previous September.

The audit found widespread moral decay across budgeting, accounting, personnel, and general affairs at KEEU. In particular, improper use of corporate cards amounted to 264 cases totaling 126 million KRW. Professor A paid 1.27 million KRW for a Korean traditional meal at a restaurant using three corporate and research fund cards. He used a method of splitting payments across the three cards at one-minute intervals. Such fraudulent use occurred 14 times, totaling approximately 8.8 million KRW.

Employee B prepaid caf? points (securities) with a corporate card and set the system so that usage required entering the last digits of their personal phone number, then privately used some of the points. Additionally, 28 cases (about 8 million KRW) of improper execution and settlement of business promotion expenses and negligence in managing grants by purpose (208 billion KRW in grants meant for project expenses were used for institutional operating and facility costs) were also detected.

In personnel and general affairs, 206 cases (about 17 million KRW) of false attendance by 47 employees were confirmed. A representative case involved a team leader who fraudulently received 3.2 million KRW in overtime pay by logging off from an external location after working hours to match the overtime end time, repeated 25 times. KEEU was also found to have independently decided on a 13.8% salary increase last year compared to the previous year without consulting the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, using only internal approval.

There were also 31 cases (about 20 million KRW) of purchasing supplies with research funds that were not closely related to research projects. Professor C used 5.3 million KRW over four occasions to buy wireless headphones, a shoe dryer, and an air purifier, which were not directly related to research project execution.

The Ministry stated, “Given that KEEU’s budget is running a massive deficit and is funded by contributions from KEPCO, KEPCO group companies, the government, and local governments, rational budget execution is even more required. The widespread management failures, regulatory violations, and disciplinary lapses across the university’s operations call for strict measures.”

The Ministry added, “We have recommended dismissal to the KEEU board of directors for the president due to inadequate supervision, improper execution and management of the president’s personal business promotion expenses, and negligence in reporting important matters to the board and the Ministry. We also notified relevant public personnel institutions of misconduct by the previous auditor who failed to fulfill reporting obligations to the board and the Ministry following the KEPCO consulting results.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.