Two Norwich Union employees jailed

Failed Zimbabwean asylum seekers Edward Dzingai, 27, and Gregory Maumbe, 26, both worked at Norwich Union's Pomona House in Pear Street, Ecclesall Road, Sheffield.

They used their positions to gain access to the personal insurance policy details of 28 "gone away" customers or clients for whom the company had no current address.

The two insurance workers targeted 28 policies yielding more than £655,395, between September 2005 and October 2007. They also tried to steal a further £144,000 but failed.

Dzingai and Maumbe both pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to obtain money transfers by deception.

Maumbe admitted receiving up to £40,000 for his part in the operation, while Dzingai said he received between £1,500 and £2,000 for five different transactions.

They have both been sentenced to five years in prison for deception, plus an extra six months for possessing fake passports.

David Ross, head of media relations at Norwich Union Life, said it was the company which had uncovered the scandal.

He said: "People might ask why we employed these people in the first place, but the fact of the matter was that they were good enough to get past immigration in the first place.

"They had worked for us for a number of years, and been in this country for a number of years."

According to the spokesman, the pair had been working in an area which involved looking at unclaimed assets and had effectively pretended to be policyholders themselves to gain access to the cash.

"We have tens of millions of pounds that we are currently and actively trying to reunite with the people that own it, we write to the last known addresses but as you will appreciate, a lot of the time we just come up against a brick wall.

"What they were able to do is step in at that point and present themselves as the people we were looking for," he added.