WHISTLEBLOWING POLICY
Introduction
1. Blessed Grace Social Services Limited (“the Charity”) is committed to upholding the highest standards of accountability, integrity, and transparency.
2. This policy is drawn up to allow and encourage employees, volunteers, beneficiaries, and other relevant stakeholders to report and raise concerns without fear of reprisal or unfair treatment. It provides a formal process to raise and handle whistle-blowing concerns and a framework to support the process.
Scope
3. Whistle-blowing is to report concerns in good faith on any misconduct and/or malpractice which may be detrimental to the Charity. This includes any failure to comply with legal obligations, threats to the health or safety of employees and/or the public, possible fraud (e.g. theft, corruption, misrepresentation, bribery, kickback, or embezzlement), abuse of power, and any deliberate attempts to conceal any of the listed examples.
4. Whistleblowing is not a platform to report personal grievances or personal matters. As such, whistle-blowing is not the platform to report matters pertaining to terms of employment, remuneration and performance appraisal, allegations of unfair treatment at work, bullying and harassment, and/or disagreements between employees or management.
5. Whistle-blowers should report in good faith and for the best interest of the Charity. It should not be done with any other intents. The Charity is entitled to carry out disciplinary or other legal action against any whistle-blowers who report with malicious intents.
Confidentiality & protection
6. The Charity commits to safeguarding the confidentiality of the whistle-blower and will preserve confidentiality by keeping the complaint and report information secure and only accessible to designated persons.
7. Reprisal, discrimination, and/or harassment against whistle-blowers who report in good faith will not be tolerated by the Charity. The Charity commits to protect whistle-blowers from threats to employment and any other threats of retaliatory action. Disciplinary action shall be taken against those who retaliate, harass, or discriminate against whistle-blowers.
8. The Charity will keep the details of the complaint confidential unless it is obliged legally to disclose the information, or if the information is already in public domain.
9. Further, the Charity and its Whistle-blowing Governance Officer shall ensure that the details of the complaint are safeguarded with the strictest confidence, maintaining the confidentiality of those who may be involved in the reported case.
10. This includes the protection of the persons who have been reported on. The Charity will operate on the presumption of innocence until proven to have committed the misconduct/malpractice.
Procedure for reporting
11. The whistle-blower may raise his/her concerns by sending an e-mail or writing a letter, and send it to the Charity:
(a) Letter addressed to:
Blessed Grace Social Services Limited
18 Arumugam Road
#05-01 Antioch@MacPherson
Singapore 409962
[Note: Please mark the envelope with “Private and confidential (WB report)”]
(b) Email to info@blessedgrace.org
[Note: Please indicate “Private and confidential (WB report)” in your email subject title]
12. The Charity accepts anonymous reporting. However, a whistle-blower is encouraged to include his identity such as his name and relevant contact information in the event further clarification is required to facilitate the investigation, and for follow-up purposes. If the complaint made is anonymous, the Charity will assess the nature of the complaint, its merits, and whether the complaint can be verified. Same processes will apply for anonymous complaints which are credible and pursuable. However, anonymous whistle-blowers will not be informed of the outcome of the complaint.
13. To enable investigation to be conducted, the whistle-blower should provide pertinent and material details in the report, such as the alleged malpractice/misconduct, parties involved, date, time, and description of the incident, evidence or any other important information to substantiate the report.
14. All information reported will be kept strictly confidential. Whistle-blowers who provided their contact information will be provided an acknowledgment of receipt of the complaint, and be kept updated on the progress and outcome of his report.
Handling of complaints
15. On receiving a complaint, the Chairman of the Board and the Board Director in-charge of audit will review it to assess and decide on the gravity and veracity of the complaint. If these two Board members are convinced that there is an issue to be pursued, they may decide to have the matter (i) investigated internally, (ii) referred to an appropriate law enforcement agency, and/or (iii) investigated by an independent external party.
16. If investigated internally, the Chairman and Director in-charge of audit shall appoint an investigation committee comprising at least three independent persons who are unrelated to the complaint. The person(s) who are connected to the complaint will not be part of the investigation committee.