Taiwanese tourist claims S$3000 was stolen from him at Sentosa hotel, says his image of SG as a safe place has changed

SINGAPORE: A tourist from Taiwan took to social media on Friday (Oct 17) to say that S$3,000 had gone missing from his hotel room at Sentosa, adding that he suspected that his money had been taken by someone on the staff.

In a post on Threads, a user on the platform going by @yang.house.tw wrote that he had checked into Village Hotel Sentosa the day before.

As he was on his way to a Halloween Horror Nights event at Universal Studios Singapore on the evening of Oct 16, he decided to leave some money in his hotel room for safekeeping. He placed approximately S$3,000 in a white plastic bag from Marina Bay Sands and left it on one of the countertops in his hotel room.

However, he noticed it was gone the next day.

According to a report in AsiaOne, the post author is a 28-year-old Taiwanese property agent named Chang Shuoyang.

In his Threads post, he expressed how helpless he felt upon discovering that his money was gone. Moreover, he was told by the hotel manager how much he trusts the people working for him and could not believe that such a theft would happen.

He was also asked by the personnel of the hotel to go through the garbage collection to search for the missing bag, although he found nothing. Mr Chang posted a photo of himself looking through trash bags, which he did until the police arrived.

The tourist claimed that when the police searched the locker of the housekeeper who had cleaned his room, they found a white plastic bag that was similar to the one he had placed his money in. This reportedly shocked the manager, given that the woman had no reason to have a bag from another hotel among her possessions.

The woman was later questioned by the police, although she denied taking Mr Chang’s money.

“Be careful when visiting Singapore; hotel staff can steal money. This completely changes the image of Singapore as a safe and secure place… This is the first time I’ve had money stolen from a high-end hotel overseas,” he wrote at the end of his post.

On Saturday (Oct 18), he added an update to his post, saying that he had yet to hear from the hotel, and that no compensation had been made for the money he had lost.

The Police have confirmed to Mothership that the incident is under investigation, and a 34-year-old woman is assisting. The hotel also told Mothership that they cannot comment on the matter at the moment, given the ongoing investigations. They said, however, that they are cooperating with the authorities and remain in contact with Mr Chang. /TISG

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