dilemma day

The day started off well enough, but after the first hour in the office, the proverbial shit began to hit-eth the fan. The whole point of an internship is to adapt and learn from the environment you are placed in, and use that knowledge gained to flourish in future career placements. So, since the beginning of this internship I have followed every example my boss has set, which for the most part has proven to be a great learning experience. However, despite my better instincts, I took my boss' lead on how to work with PAC documents. All PAC accounts require 2 document submittals, a copy of a voided check and a payment info form. We mail the payment form out to customers and request they send it back with a void check. At least 75% of the time customers only send back that payment form, with no voided check. This doesn't seem like a big deal. But, if the SFPP office does not receive copies of BOTH of these forms, they take the account off of PAC to Monthly. A switch to monthly means that customers have to make 2 months payments at once, and it does not come directly out of their account. This can be especially bad for customers who are difficult to contact, because they can go weeks/months under the impression that their account is fine and that they have full insurance coverage, when in reality they may have already incurred a lapse (resulting in a fine from the state of MD). So, to avoid this problem, my boss has told me that when I get a payment form in the mail, if there is no void check with it that I should just submit a random check that has already been submitted for another account so that the policyholder will not be taken off the PAC, saying that the office never looks closely at those docs anyway. This is obviously NOT true, because one of the guys in our office found a payment of $290 taken out of his account. Upon further review, they found the payment had been taken out as a payment on another policyholder's account. The payment plan office had tried to use the banking information given for her account, but when that did not work, they looked to the supporting check, which happened to be my coworker's account information. I would bet that this is probably not the first time something like this has happened, and I can't help but feel like it's my fault. I should have questioned my boss the first time he had me doing this to the accounts, because it seemed illogical that the payment plan office would require these documents and then never need to use them. It just makes me upset that I was put in this situation because I feel like I am at fault, when I was only following orders. The quote "it's not personal, it's just business" comes to mind at a time like this, but honestly business IS personal, and it is stupid to try and reason that it is not. I take it PERSONAL that my co-worker got screwed, and I take it PERSONAL that other regular people I don't even know could be getting screwed as well. UGHHHH. This is the first ethical dilemma I've faced at work and I really don't like the tense feeling left in the pit of my stomach. I'm hoping me and my boss can sort out some new system for what to do with policyholders that don't submit void checks, because I will not go along with the current system anymore.