False information regarding education on job applications

Section 69 – Founded –– Fraud – False information regarding education on job applications

Authority: This investigation was conducted under section 69 of the Public Service Employment Act, S.C. 2003, c.22, ss. 12 and 13.

Issue: The purpose of this investigation was to determine whether a public servant committed fraud in 2 appointment processes by indicating on their job applications that they had obtained a high school diploma, when this was not the case.

Conclusions: The investigation concluded that the public servant committed fraud in 2 appointment processes by falsely claiming to have a secondary school diploma on job applications.

Facts: In 2006, a federal organization launched an advertised appointment process to staff administrative positions requiring a secondary school diploma or equivalent. In the résumé submitted for this process, the applicant indicated that they had a high school diploma. At the end of the process, the applicant was appointed to an indeterminate position. In 2016, the same organization opened a new appointment process to staff officer positions that required 2 years of postsecondary education or an acceptable combination of education and experience. On the application, the public servant who was appointed after the 2006 process provided this response to a screening question: “I obtained my high school diploma in 2003.” Following the assessments, the public servant was selected for an acting appointment of more than 4 months. Human Resources (HR) asked the public servant for a copy of their diploma or transcripts. The public servant never produced these documents and admitted to not having a high school diploma. The organization then sent the case to the Public Service Commission for investigation.

Despite having first claimed to have completed high school on their application, over the course of the investigation the public servant finally admitted to having failed 2 of the courses required to obtain the diploma. The public servant explained that after high school, near the end of summer 2003, an employment centre helped them write their first résumé. Because the public servant had informed the employment centre that they had completed all the courses and the exams, the employment centre indicated on the résumé that the public servant had obtained a highschool diploma. Afterwards, on job applications the public servant always copied from their résumé without noticing that it contained incorrect information.

The investigation determined that the public servant’s testimony was not credible. The investigation revealed that, prior to the 2006 process, none of the job applications submitted by the public servant mentioned the diploma. Thus, on the balance of probabilities, the diploma was not indicated in the original version of the public servant’s résumé. It is also unlikely that the public servant did not notice that the diploma was mentioned on their résumé as they had updated their work experience and email address, both of which were found in the section next to the “EDUCATION” section on the résumé. The investigation concluded that the public servant knowingly submitted job applications containing incorrect information about their education, knowing that this information was false, which constitutes dishonesty.

The 2 appointment processes were compromised because the public servant submitted job applications containing false information about their education that was used to determine that they met the education merit criteria.

Corrective action:

Following the conclusion of fraud, the Commission ordered that:

• the appointment of the public servant be revoked;
• for 3 years, the individual must inform the Commission in writing before accepting any position in the federal public service; failure to do so will result in the revocation of the new appointment.

Investigation File No.: 19-20-05