Tessa Grant appears in Hamilton District Court on Monday for sentencing on fraud charges.

It was the plane trip the principal didn't take that led to fraudster Tessa Grant's unravelling.

The discovery of a receipt for the $1492 return flight turned out to be the tip of an iceberg of swindling.

The flight to Christchurch in April 2015 - supposedly for Waikato Diocesan School for Girls principal Vicky McLennan and her husband - was actually taken by Grant and her husband.

SUPPLIED SkyCity Hamilton, where Grant was employed from 2008 to 2013.

Grant, 41, ripped off her employers at Waikato Dio and SkyCity Hamilton to the tune of $800,000 and $2 million respectively.

On Monday, in the Hamilton District Court, she went from wiping available funds out of the two organisations' coffers to wiping the tears from her eyes as she was jailed for seven years and eight months.

Judge Philip Connell also issued a 50 per cent non-parole period.

FAIRFAX NZ Waikato Diocesan for Girls was also ripped off by Grant.

It was a dramatic fall from grace for Grant, who used the money she stole to fund a luxurious equestrian-oriented lifestyle.

She pleaded guilty in June to swindling $1,980,922.02 from SkyCity over five years; she pleaded guilty in January last year to swiping $795,000 from the school.

She had been due to be sentenced in 2016 on seven charges of fraud laid over the Waikato Dio offending, but that was postponed when her SkyCity offending came to light.

KELLY HODEL/FAIRFAX NZ Tessa Grant's property in Horotui Rd, Whatawhata.

Crown prosecutor Ross Douch sought a starting point for sentence of eight to eight-and-a-half years in jail, while defence lawyer Guyon Foley asked for seven to seven-and-a-half years.

Judge Connell opted for eight-and-a-half before factoring in discounts. But there were few of these.

Full reparation had been paid to the school by Grant, including an extra $105,523.63 to cover interest, legal and related costs the organisation had incurred. But the judge decided she deserved no credit whatsoever for this.

As Douch told the court earlier, "You don't get credit for paying back what you shouldn't have had in the first place."

Also, the school had moved quickly to freeze Grant's assets, leaving her with no choice.

Judge Connell could also make no deduction for remorse.

"You have sought to minimise and justify your offending."

A pre-sentence report concluded Grant had a "high sense of entitlement".

"You don't have remorse. You simply regret the fact that you have been caught."

Grant's guilty pleas were worth only 10 months off the total sentence.

Earlier, Foley told the court his client was "wracked by guilt and remorse".

"She has nothing now. She has the clothes she is standing up in."

Grant had begun taking the money to support a family member, but "the perceived need became greed".

"It's unfortunate for her and for SkyCity that her offending ran unchecked for so long."

The SkyCity embezzlement - covered by three fraud charges - took place via 71 transactions between December 2008 and April 2013.

While employed as the finance manager and on a salary of $125,000, Grant began banking cheques that were supposed to be used for SkyCity business.

Toward the end of her employment, Grant acted as the general manager and her annual salary was $189,000.

"It is clear that she was able to take advantage of poor practice by other SkyCity senior managers," the agreed summary of facts states.

In her role, Grant had access to large amounts of petty cash, which was held in what was called the "cage".

Between March 4, 2013, and April 26, 2013, she made three cash withdrawals from the cashier desk totalling $184,250.

To support her request, she provided fake invoices from Hawkins Construction, which had been involved in building work at the casino.

Grant also used some of the cash to pay part of the settlement on two properties.

And on one occasion, she used SkyCity's computer system to pay $82,500 to a New Zealand equestrian.

SkyCity subsequently brought civil proceedings against Grant in an attempt to recoup its money. It is understood these are ongoing.

After leaving SkyCity, Grant was employed as commercial manager at Waikato Diocesan for 14 months until her resignation in September 2015.

Through a series of covert transactions and forged documents, she took $795,000 from the school between December 2014 and August 2015.

The biggest and possibly most blatant of her crimes related to work that was also done by Hawkins Construction, which had been contracted to redevelop the school's food technology block and also do work on the principal's house.

The total cost of the two projects was $600,000. However, an examination of the school accounts revealed the total value of invoices purportedly paid to Hawkins came to $1.14 million - almost double the actual cost of the work.

Twelve invoices or payment claims from Hawkins were located in the school records. Of these, six had been issued by the construction firm. The rest were forgeries.

Using her authority, Grant approved the invoices for payment by direct credit and coding against a budget. She then accessed the school's banking system and directed the payment to her personal account.

Another deception involved her using a cheque to withdraw $7500 from the school account on the pretence that it was for asbestos removal from the conversion of the principal's house. This was untrue and the cheque was made out to one of Grant's friends.

In July 2015, Grant bought a 13-hectare property in Whatawhata for about $900,000, with the aim of using it as an equestrian centre, complete with indoor arena. That purchase was made in the name of JT Equine Ltd which was a company she had formed earlier that month and of which she was the sole director.

The top payments, according to court documents, were:

Petty cash total withdrawals (several cheques), $295,294.50

Classic Horse Coaches Ltd, $281,250

Farmlands Trading Society, $264,418.01

Elizabeth Brown, $232,900.72

Landscape Design Studio, $181,915

GM Ralph Ltd, $135,632.65

Sterling Warmbloods Ltd, $126,500

Vincent Reid, $111,329.94

Jason Bugg, $108,206.90

Michael Bensemen, $75,391.80

Carpet One South Waikato, $66,419.25

Total Holdings Ltd, $61,740

Wackrow Joinery, $44,591.03

The Narrows Landing, $26,222.50

Michelle Grant (a relative), $5000