A Chinese man and Thai accomplices, including a hotelier in Udon Thani province, have been arrested for allegedly using forged credit cards to embezzle about 13 million baht for fake accommodations and services over two months.
Pol Col Padol Chandon, a commander of the Economic Crime Suppression Division, said on Tuesday that Liu Chi Chung, 48, and Thappapop Ruangpradit, 38, were arrested in Bangkok on Monday. The owner and three staff at Lotus Condotel Hotel in Muang district of Udon Thani were also charged in the case.
Police were hunting four more people suspected of receiving some of the embezzled money.
According to the commander, Mr Liu and Mr Thappapop used fake credit cards from December last year to January to pay for 144 fake key-entered transactions worth 13.28 million baht in total at the hotel. Each transaction, worth tens or hundreds of thousands of baht, was supposedly for the accommodations of a group of foreign tourists.
Copies of their passports and credit cards, as well as room reservation forms, had been prepared in case credit-card issuing banks demanded evidence. Some transactions were for product purchases at the hotel.
The group's members then received their shares of the money when the issung bank transferred the money to the hotel for the fake transactions.
The Chinese man, Mr Thappapop, hotel owner Thanawut Isarangkun na Ayutthaya, hotel manager Sakda Pongpetra and hotel staff Panisa Seeho were charged with credit card forgery and use of fake credit cards and embezzlement, Pol Col Padol said. They denied the charges.