A childcare worker has pleaded guilty to the theft of $42,000 from a northside centre.
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Tanya Maree Diamond, 42, appeared in the ACT Magistrates Court on Tuesday on one count of obtaining property by deception.
She had originally faced 47 separate counts, but the prosecution rolled them into one all-encompassing charge.
Diamond began working at the Baringa Child Care Centre as a casual carer in 2001 and was promoted to office administrator in 2003.
Her role at the Spence centre included collecting and collating staff time sheets, processing pay, managing enquiries, superannuation, tax, and leave.
But she used her position to fraudulently amend her work hours to steal a total of $42,642.19 between August 2010 and July 2013.
Court documents said Diamond would enter into the system extra hours she had not worked to get extra pay.
The fraud went unnoticed until Diamond quit the not-for-profit centre in December last year.
Her replacement identified the rort while finalising long-service leave paperwork.
Police were called and provided with time sheets and payroll information from the centre's system.
A check of the information identified 44 occasions where records did not match each other.
Police seized account records from the Mawson branch of Diamond's bank in May.
A review of the bank statements matched payments to the fraudulent transactions from the child care centre.
Diamond declined to be interviewed by police in June.
The matter was committed to the ACT Supreme Court for sentence. It will appear for mention later this month.