SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Two Sacramento trucking company owners have been charged on multiple counts of insurance fraud, resulting in a $234,000 loss to their insurer and a $220,000 loss to the Employment Development Department (EDD).
Hardip Singh, 44, and Amandeep Kaur, 36, are accused of misclassifying employees as independent contractors in an attempt to underreport payroll by $1.4 million and thus avoid paying higher workers' compensation premiums. Singh and Kaur's company, Trust Transport, Inc. is a long-haul trucking company based out of Sacramento, with a separate trucking yard located in West Sacramento.
From February 2014 to October 2016, Singh and Kaur allegedly misclassified workers as independent contractors rather than as employees -- this changes the way workers are paid. The two reported just $105,811 in payroll expenses for those workers, which turned out to be vastly understated.
The Department of Insurance found that roughly $1,436,387 in payroll expenses went unreported by the pair. In other words, workers for Trust Transport were essentially being paid 'off the books.' With that income not being reported to Trust Transport's insurance companies, premiums on insurance policies were being underpaid.
“By underreporting payroll and employees, not only are business owners breaking the law they are putting honest businesses at risk,” said Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara. “We investigate cases like this to protect legitimate businesses and California consumers who pay the price for this type of fraud through higher insurance premiums and increased costs.”
Charges against Singh and Kaur allege that the misclassification of employees was purposeful in order to avoid paying higher workers' compensation insurance premiums, which were estimate to be in the hundreds of thousands.
This resulted in a substantial loss for the State Compensation Insurance Fund, which handled Trust Transport's workers' compensation insurance coverage, and for EDD.
Both Singh and Kaur self-surrendered to the Sacramento County Superior County. The Sacramento County District Attorney's Office is prosecuting the case.
