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GOC suspends Chertsey optometrist for fraud

Chertsey-based optometrist Tajinder Ghattaora has been suspended from the General Optical Council’s register for two months after his fitness to practise was found to be impaired by reason of misconduct.

Ghattaora was found to have submitted fraudulent claims to his private health insurance provider using falsified receipts belonging to patients.

The Council alleged that in 2021, he created a false receipt using his own receipt and a receipt belonging to a patient who paid £340 for eyewear.

Ghattaora stuck together the top part of his receipt and the bottom of the patient’s receipt and did the same with another patient’s receipt who paid £437.50.

The registrant then submitted false claims on two occasions for spectacles for himself to a third-party insurance provider.