Employee theft plagues businesses worldwide, and one of the most widespread forms of employee theft is Theft of Time. Research by Acroprint indicated that time theft costs American businesses hundreds of billions of dollars each year which results from employees who steal from their employers by willfully wasting time for which they are paid. The report went on to conclude that the average employee steals 54 minutes per day or 4.5 hours per week from their employer equating to nearly six full work weeks per year for what they referred to as an average employee. Imagine how much worse it is with your employees who are not supervised in an office such as outside sales, runners, and delivery personnel.
Over the years we have seen employee theft and theft of time in a variety of ways. Surveillance has shown employees fraudulently claiming Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) privileges, using paid sick days to conduct social activities, using company time and resources to conduct personal business and even putting off work to create overtime hours. Added to that today’s employer has to worry about the added issues computers and internet access brings to the table. We have seen hundreds of hours stolen while employees were searching for and downloading music for their iPods on company time, socializing on sites like Facebook, forwarding joke emails to what must seem like everyone they know, going to online dating sites, and even regularly searching employment and recruiting sites like Monster to submit their resumes all while on the company clock. What’s worse is that with the false sense of self entitlement that is running rampant in today’s society along with the growing lack of work ethic, the employees see nothing wrong with this, and without documentation an employer who fires an employee thief may find themselves defending an unemployment claim by the dismissed thief.
As stated above, computers have brought a new dimension to this problem and the investigator who is retained to handle this type of case needs to have a special skill set. With experienced investigators who also have very strong network engineering and technical backgrounds, our firm is uniquely qualified to handle not only the investigation, but documentation of your case. Whether the evidence is obtained using GPS satellite tracking units on a company car used by the outside salesman, computer logs that tracked activity across your network, hidden cameras, or an undercover operative inside your offices, our investigators know how to properly document the findings and present them on your behalf it needed.
If you think you may have a theft issue or if you would just like to learn more about how our firm can assist you if the need arises, contact us now at 972-617-9210 to speak with an investigator. There is no charge for the consultation, and all calls are confidential.
