This time, it wasn't the recruiter lying.
An in-house solicitor has been struck off after lying on his CV that he was awarded a first-class degree when applying for a job at Squire Patton Boggs.
Vishal Patel, who qualified in 2020, was working as a legal counsel at Aviva Insurance.
In August 2022, he sent his CV to a recruitment agency to apply for a role as a funds associate at SPB. However, his CV contained various lies, most notably that he was awarded a first-class law degree from the University of Aston, when he had actually got a 2:2 from Birmingham City University.
He was also economical with the actualité when stating that he had achieved a 'very competent" grade in the Bar Professional Training Course, and that he had gone to Leicester Grammar School when he had attended Crown Hills college.
After an interview, SBP offered Patel the job. However, pre-employment checks by Vero, a screening business, alerted the firm to various discrepancies between Patel's CV and its questionnaire.
SPB's head of HR held a meeting with the solicitor, where she questioned him about the inaccuracies. Patel gave unsatisfactory responses, but admitted that he had "created a persona that he thought was required for a role in private practice." The firm rescinded the job offer.
In November 2022, a SPB partner reported Patel to the SRA stating that he had applied for a job at the firm providing "false and misleading information" in his CV.
In February 2023, Patel disclosed the SRA investigation to Aviva. The company looked into the matter, and requested that Patel provide a copy of his "correct" CV, as well as the CV he'd originally sent to the recruiter, and asked that he highlight the discrepancies.
Aviva found that the "correct" CV submitted by Patel was still inaccurate, and that he had not honest about the inaccuracies.
In trying to cover up one of the CV lies, Patel told Aviva that he had put down Leicester Grammar rather than Crown Hills School, as the two schools had merged, and were essentially the same school. But Aviva noted they were "very separate and a Google search shows this." In April 2023, Aviva dismissed Patel.
The SRA brought the matter before the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal, which noted that Patel had "admitted dishonesty and acting without integrity" and that his actions had "the potential to directly harm the reputation of the legal profession."
The tribunal therefore struck Patel off the roll and ordered that he pay £5,313 in costs.
Comments
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Oh was that the same true academic background as Reeves 🤥 and Little Johnny Reynolds then?!
🤔
The difference being that they weren’t actually struck off or otherwise professionally punished by their respective Professional Body. Is that it?!
Or is it because they’re both white and in Government and he is brown and isn’t?
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I cannot even begin to imagine the awkwardness of his discussion with Aviva. "So, I was applying for a job with someone else... And some issues arose in relation to my CV...."
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Premeditated dishonesty. Good riddance!
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In olden days "obtaining services (employment) by deception" though now fraud. Shame aviva did not bring a private prosecution.
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He should not have done this, and it's right to strike him off for lying, but it is sad that he felt going to a state school was one of the things he needed to hide on his cv.
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How stupid. First, he could have had a cushy in-house career at a FTSE-100. Second, why did he feel the need to lie to SPB about going to a state school. Third, why lie between Birmingham City and Aston?!
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It's the lie about Aston that baffles me the most.
Why pick that as your upgrade to Birmingham? You could pick literally anywhere for your made up degree to be from...
It's like trying to chat up a girl in a club by bullshitting her you own a penthouse in Skegness and you'll totally fly her out there for your second date. Just say somewhere in the South of France you muppet!
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Imagine the crushing levels of utter desperation that you lie on your CV to try and get hired by a shop like SPB.
Solzhenitsyn himself wouldn't believe.
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While many appear keen to put the boot in, I feel sorry for the individual concerned. It strikes me that he has not benefited from any guidance and while what he did was wrong, I believe him when he said he had created a persona that he thought necessary in order to advance. Look at the university that he chose to lie about, most people wouldn't for a moment think to distinguish between them and many wouldn't even be familiar with either. Feeling the need to change the school is achingly sad, and in the current climate probably counter productive. There are no winners and I'm sure he's otherwise a decent and hardworking lad that wanted to better himself professionally. Had I been the partner at SPB, I would not have reported him and while I understand why the job offer was rescinded I would not have taken that extra step. I would certainly be no good exercising any form of judicial function in this matter as I would have given him some words to the wise so he learns from it in the hope he would progress to have a happy and successful career in the law. Final point, I wonder if those taking a somewhat puritan and joyous zeal from this episode can really claim that they have never done something that was a bit silly in their younger days. I doubt the person concerned will be reading these pages but if they do I hope they can dust themselves off and build a successful and rewarding career, who knows perhaps when looking back at this unfortunate episode it may turn out to the making of him.
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He deserved to be struck off. Not for his dishonesty but for how dumb his lies were.
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Never lie. I tink parents need to be very very careful in making sure very basic moral principles are explained to small children and so as they grow up they know parents would rather they fail than get something through lying. Also both universities are bad ones so it is quite funny he thought lying out the supposedly better one was a worth it. Also Leicester Grammar whch is a private school surely would not swing a job in a firm? It is not exactly a leading light eg 61% A star/A at A level is not quite in the leading state and private school leagues (eg state school Henrietta B gets about 72% A Star and A combined. Why didn't Aviva check his claimed qualifications?
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10:50 - not enough ladder house in rambling pointless essay, 3/10 must try harder.
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Very odd
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I felt initially sad for him. However, having read the article he lie and then doubled down on those lies when challenged. Not a lot of sympathy for him now.
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I wonder why he went for the Sir Geoff from Aston instead of Brum?
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Anonymous @12.03 - translation into English?
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@Anonymous 10:50 - why bother to have GPT produce such a meaningless comment and spam it into the ROF comments section?
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Highly unsurprising.
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I see people trying to suggest this fraudsters act of fraud should be pitied. If you think that, then you are a woke wanker partly responsible for the moral decay destroying society.
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Let's hope he moves on with his life and is not disillusioned with with it. And he doesn't convert to militant form of Islam (as many disillusioned / loner brits do) to become like Anjem Choudary who was a former lawyer too.
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Finally, a worthy strike off
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He could have said he went to Hull University.
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@Anonymous 07/02 00:01
What a strange thought? What makes you think he'd decide to convert to a "militant form of Islam" when they guys name seems to be of Hindu descent, not Muslim?
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Most of us have personas to survive in the city/law because we are not private school posh people
No excuse for lying (and rightfully punished) but just focusing on the underlying issue here in law which is huge class issues that nobody wants to address