Three cleaning company senior executives have been charged for an alleged fraud to deceive the Leisure & Cultural Services Department over cleaning workers' pay.

Yu's Tin Sing Enterprises general manager Yu Lai-yin, 42, and the company's contract and district managers Ng Lam-tim, 51, and So Mun-yu, 28, appeared at Eastern magistracy today. No pleas were taken and Magistrate Ian Candy adjourned the case to February 7, pending transfer to the District Court.

Yu was granted $100,000 bail, while Ng and So were each given $50,000 bail. The defendants were ordered not to leave Hong Kong.

They were arrested by the Independent Commission Against Corruption for allegedly conspiring together to defraud the department by falsely representing to it that Yu's Tin Sing had paid its workers the stipulated wages in accordance with those specified in a contract between the company and the department, and inducing the department to make monthly payments to Yu's Tin Sing pursuant to the said contract.

It was suspected the workers had not been paid the stipulated wages in full. The alleged offence took place between December 2003 and last April.