Major changes to job description, parts of role taken from me & outsourced

Taiko

Just really after some general advice here. I work in local government.

I joined the LA I work for in 2006, and transferred into my current role in 2010.

In July 2013, with no consultation, a large chunk of the financial function I undertook was taken from me, and outsourced for another company to deal with. The outsourcing was a terrible mess, resulting in relationships I built up with suppliers deteriorating overnight due to late/missing payments, incorrect data on remittance documents etc.

The outsourcing thing was just decided on, and I was not asked for opinions at all. This left me on the same pay grade as previously, but with a significant reduction in my workload. I was managing the workload well previously, keeping everything completely up to date whilst adding in improvements/cost savings. In my development reviews, I was always graded as performing exceptionally well.

I'm unsure if it's paranoia, but the decision to outsource part of the role was made not long after I challenged a colleague on their part of the process. Ultimately, they would sign off my financial work, but due to IT issues, they were actually duplicating it, thus paying suppliers twice. Rather than contact the supplier and get them to refund, my colleague instead created dummy credit notes on the system, and offset these against future invoices. I raised this as a concern based on audit, in that if we had any inspection, HMRC or anyone would not be able to find these credit notes on an invoice, as it didn't exist. My comments were dismissed, on the basis that the action they had taken was "for the best". The suppliers were not aware.

Since July, I've got on with what I do have, but I'm significantly underemployed and, despite looking for additional work, am given instructions by my line manager not to take on additional stuff. At times, I'm waiting for a phone to ring or an email to come in.

I've had the development review to set out objectives for this coming year today, and have been told that further parts of my current role will also be outsourced, but my own role will still exist. It will just be a case of I will no longer have some more of my duties.

For the coming year, I am now being expected to project manage a couple of engineering projects. I have no experience in this area, and this sort of thing doesn't appear in my current job description. I'm not an engineer, and wouldn't have a clue on what really needs to be done or how best to achieve this. I'm a finance person, used to identifying cost savings and doing budget analysis.

I'm unsure if it's just the organisation changing, or perhaps they are trying to manage me into a resignation. My line manager and one other colleague appear to be having a lot of conversations about things that impact on my role, and making decisions from there. I did find, thanks to the phone system that we share, that they had been in discussions around 9pm at night, which is very odd for both of them to be honest. I'll often log in remotely late evening to check my schedule for the following day, and their login pattern flags up whenever I do this.

Any thoughts on this? I'd rather people be as brutally honest in any reply, so feel free to say if you do think I'm maybe overreacting here. The general impression I get though is that I may be a bit too switched on to some of the more in depth financial aspects than my two colleagues, who are not finance-trained although operate in that arena, and that I may be seen as a threat if they are trying to cover up mistakes they are making or, in the worst case scenario, commit fraud.

wapow

Now that you're in the know, be warned that even leaving the company does not absolve you of any legal action. I would strongly suggest covering your back before it gets too late. You've not mentioned much about legal action but you need to think about this seriously because it sounds to me like not only are they taking your work away from you but they might be setting you up for something and also trying to, as you say, keep you away from cottoning onto the way the finances are being managed.


The reasons are there to see why they wont keep you in the loop about major changes and also why theyre trying to move you into something you don't know but in reality trying to move you out of the company.


You noticing the issue with payments and then the whole thing "moving offshore" without your knowledge and so soon reeks of playing with the law.

Taiko

My thoughts exactly. Good practice would have been to have obtained credit notes from each supplier, apologised that it had happened, then logged the incoming note. You'd have an audit trail tht could then stand up to any scrutiny.

I've raised it as an issue via email, but the responses I got were verbal. I've kept a record of the emails sent, and kept a copy on a USB stick. I have considered whistleblowing, but as yet haven't.

In the meantime, I intend to carry on to the best of my ability, but it's certainly pushing me a bit emotionally right now. Having more and more financial stuff moved away from me, with oversight only falling to the other two just doesn't help.

wapow

You need to think a little further as to what they were offsetting the credits to and whether these companies that were paid double ever shared that money back to the company?


You wont know the answers to this but whistleblowing would be the next step especially as they wont even give you answers in a written form!


Its all there in front of you, its just a matter of gathering the muster to take action.

Paypeanuts

I would not expect you to be consulted at all on outsourcing any element of you work, to be frank.


However I think it it were me I would be discussing the whole double billing element with my upline, hopscotching over my current manager, because proper financial control is not being exerted.

Gavin83

If you work in local government you'll almost certainly have a whistle blowing scheme, so contact your internal audit department with the information you have.

Chances are those staff won't be around too much longer to bother you.

Denning.

Gavin83 wrote: »

If you work in local government you'll almost certainly have a whistle blowing scheme, so contact your internal audit department with the information you have.

Chances are those staff won't be around too much longer to bother you.

This. You need to document and have proof that you have made someone aware of discrepancies

Taiko

Thanks everyone. I'm in the process of taking screenshots of all the data, which will then be passed with the emails to internal audit. Managed to find out our internal procedure for it, and they agree any reports are confidential.

It would be obvious that I was behind it though, so I guess it's a case of waiting to see any outcomes.

Thank you again for the advice.