A supervisor at the government's utility bills paying agency ARMS is being investigated after being allegedly caught skimming money off certain clients to pay his own bills or those of a third party who paid him bribes for the favour.

The abuse was flagged to the police by the Energy Ministry after a whistleblower came forward during a review that was being carried out on the agency, which uncovered a number of discrepancies.

So far only one person has been arrested in connection with the case, which, involved several such abusive transactions in 2012.

The review has now been stepped up to a fully fledged internal audit.

The Energy Ministry said in a statement that ARMS suspended the employee with immediate effect. The employee was also ordered to return the company’s property and the company reserved the right to take action against the employee.

The ministry said that a review for the revision of the company’s operations, internal procedures, controls and customer care service levels was commissioned this week with the aim of improving them for the benefit of consumers.

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