| (a) | contravenes any provision of this Act or fails to comply therewith; |
| (b) | makes or causes to be made any claim for the payment of any benefit allegedly due in terms of the rules of a medical scheme, knowing such claim to be false; |
| (c) | knowingly makes or causes to be made a false representation of any material fact to a medical scheme, for use in determining any right to any benefit allegedly due in terms of the rules of the medical scheme; |
| (d) | having knowledge of any fact or the occurrence of any event affecting his or her right to receive any benefit in terms of the rules of a medical scheme, and who fails to disclose such fact or event to the medical scheme with the intent to obtain from the medical scheme a benefit to which he or she is not entitled or a larger benefit than that to which he or she is entitled; |
| (e) | renders a statement, account or invoice to a member or any other person, knowing that such statement, account or invoice is false and which may be used by such member or other person to claim from a medical scheme any benefit or a benefit greater than the benefit to which he or she is entitled in terms of the rules of the medical scheme; or |
| (f) | [Section 66(1)(f) deleted by the Medical Schemes Amendment Act, 2001] |
shall, subject to the provisions of subsection (2), be guilty of an offence, and liable on conviction to a fine or to imprisonment for a period not exceeding five years or to both a fine and imprisonment.
| (2) | No contravention or failure to comply with any provision of this Act shall be punishable under subsection (1) if the act or omission constituting that contravention or failure to comply with any request or requirement is punishable as an offence under the provisions of any other Act of Parliament which controls the professional conduct of any health care provider. |
| (3) | Any person who fails to furnish the Council or the Registrar with a return, information, financial statement, document or a reply to an enquiry addressed to him or her, as provided for by this Act or any directive under this Act, within the prescribed or specified period or any extension thereof, shall irrespective of any criminal proceedings instituted under this Act, be liable to a penalty as prescribed for every day which the failure continues, unless the Registrar, for good cause shown, waives the penalty or any part thereof. |
| (4) | Any penalty imposed under subsection (3) shall be a debt due to the Council. |
