Employee stealing from work - advice?

bristol_pilot

Just dismiss him. For no reason if he has less than 1 year employment with you, or for the theft if longer. Reasonable suspicion is enough, you don't need the level of proof that would be needed for a criminal prosecution. (You don't have enough proof for a criminal prosecution by the way, so I wouldn't bother with the police). You might want to give the lad a chance to resign rather than be sacked.

I suggest you write off what has been taken so far. You don't 100% know it's him after all. And do review your cash handling procedures - leaving anyone on min wage in charge of a cash box / till is asking for trouble never mind a 17 year old.

I would also recommend that you do not give the lad a reference. Writing that he stole in a reference could (if the lad has rich parents) leave you vulnerable to being sued for libel and the onus of proof would be on you. You don't want to risk that, so don't give a reference at all.

CFC

bristol_pilot wrote: »

Just dismiss him. For no reason if he has less than 1 year employment with you, or for the theft if longer. Reasonable suspicion is enough, you don't need the level of proof that would be needed for a criminal prosecution. (You don't have enough proof for a criminal prosecution by the way, so I wouldn't bother with the police). You might want to give the lad a chance to resign rather than be sacked.

I suggest you write off what has been taken so far. You don't 100% know it's him after all. And do review your cash handling procedures - leaving anyone on min wage in charge of a cash box / till is asking for trouble never mind a 17 year old.

I would also recommend that you do not give the lad a reference. Writing that he stole in a reference could (if the lad has rich parents) leave you vulnerable to being sued for libel and the onus of proof would be on you. You don't want to risk that, so don't give a reference at all.

This.
Just make sure you sack him in the right way with the right process, giving the correct amount of notice. Check it out first.

£60 and notice pay to get rid of a thief is nothing, it's a bargain. Look at the bigger picture.

sambucus I get your point, people should have an employee handbook but don't use theft to make your point. a) it's immoral whether it is employer or auntie jean you are stealing from, and b) it's illegal, whether it is employer or auntie jean you are stealing from.

DVardysShadow

heretolearn wrote: »

Well I started work at 16 and I'm pretty sure I would have known I wasn't supposed to steal from my employer or punch another employee, even without having it spelled out to me... :-)

The problem is that these days it is not obvious that stealing is wrong ....

You see so much sharp practice on the part of banks large corporations and their call centres generally, that stealing does no appear to be such a big issue.

Bettie

bristol_pilot wrote: »

And do review your cash handling procedures - leaving anyone on min wage in charge of a cash box / till is asking for trouble never mind a 17 year old.

Aw, I don't think that's a very fair statement. There are plenty of people on min. wage in charge of tills that DON'T steal.

MsHoarder

Googlewhacker wrote: »

I'll beat Uncertain to it....

You are wrong in saying that you cannot give a bad referance, you ARE allowed to give a bad referance if it is factual and truthful.

You are just not allowed to make things up.

But if you are pulled up on it, you need to be able to show evidence that the reference is truthful, which wouldn't be the case unless you can show (only on the balance of probabilities) that he was stealing.

Sambucus_Nigra wrote: »

If you are 17 and have no contract and it's your first job, how do you know that?

How do you know that you shouldn't pick something up from a shop shelf and walk out without paying? An employer shouldn't expect to teach basic legal behaviour.

xangeleyes

Are you the boss here? Or in charge? WHy don't you take him off of the till and/or cash box? Careful going around and talking to others about this though, you don't want to label him incase this is false, but you do want to keep a closer eye on him.
Perhaps tell him that there have been extra CCTV's put in, but are the tiny ones (he's 17, he'll hopefully believe that). Also that you've no idea where they are but it's to catch the theif.
Scare him and say that the boss/police have watched the CCTV that they put in last week and have found the culprit and will be questioning them later on??????

Is there anyone else it could be? At all? A manager perhaps?

xangeleyes

yinhong wrote: »

Thanks Paul, we will definitely be implementing this procedure from now on.

In the immediate situation, though, I think we will probably dismiss the employee. But if we just simply do that, it feels like he's gotten all the benefits - we've lost £60 and have to find an immediate replacement, and he's £60 up and out of a job he probably doesn't even want to be in!

I think the best case scenario would be if we could recover the £60 from him.

Forget the £60, you're not going to get it back unless you find it wedged under the till (have you checked there yet?? ), just think of the money you'll be saving if you dismiss him.

Russe11

obv not the most clever of thieves, well know fried chicken outlet where getting robbed for 100s every week by a simple scam on the till.

Quite simple to control cash handling, only let the supvisor deal with anything out of the till. Cashiers are responcible for the tills, supervisor the cashiers and the float and in turn has to account to the manager.

davester

Which is down your cardboard box of coins or the till of notes? If its the till and not the box are you sure they are not stuck behind the register drawer, money not put in or too many notes can easily catch on the roof of the outer case and get pulled out into the back of the drawer where the spring is only for it to get pushed right to the dark recess of the springs when the drawer gets shut.
I had the same thing years ago, every weekend I worked for 3 weeks there was myself, who cashed up and the same supervisor. So the Big bosses deduced if stealing was the cause for the exact note amounts missing then it was me or this old guy earning £20 per hr. I got asked in for interview and knew nothing about it, untill the end of the day when I was cashing up and happened to see a note half hanging out and then with a torch looked at the small gap between the drawer and the case and the missing money was crumpled up at the back, They ended up having to get the maintenace guy to unscrew the drawer to get them out.
Turns out the old guy was not pushing them in correctly and overfilling one note area and just wedging them in best he could. What happened in the end was I was told to check the till when I started my shift and if it was full then do a cash up. never had the problem again, Became standard practise across the whole store, cause they found other tills with money lost from months ago in other places which neither one of us would have used.

gocurlygirl

many many years ago i worked at fast food outlet and there was money going missing-week by week people were dismissed and even the management changed but still the till was short.In the end there were only 3 staff left from the original team and I know I did not steal the money.It was terrible,I decided to leave,the manager asked me to stay but I could not cope with the suspicious atmosphere.I am honest-even took £10 to market office when I found it on the ground -amd to this day wonder who it was or if it was a till problem or someone who got change wrong on a regular basis.:undecided