Disciplinary Hearing

garth549

Did they ask you to work while on furlough or did you do it voluntarily?
If they asked you to then personally I'd be making it very clear that you're considering reporting it.  They may back down.

KatrinaWaves

garth549 said:

Did they ask you to work while on furlough or did you do it voluntarily?
If they asked you to then personally I'd be making it very clear that you're considering reporting it.  They may back down.

OP has clarified in a further post he was not on furlough when this happened.

Dox

Jak1211 said:

In regards to the process, I followed it. It went through my senior and then onwards to accounts who actually overtyped the bank account name when an error flagged up.

I am low rank and in no way considered management/senior. I do however have alot of responsibility and am buying and selling expensive plant/machinery.

The other point I would make is, I have never had any cyber crime training. And considering we deal with large sums of money and work mostly via online systems and emails, I would of thought this would of been implemented?

You followed the process, your senior approved the payment and accounts then changed the details. I think you need to say all that at your disciplinary. The fact the bank account name was changed by your accounts department is extraordinary and will almost certainly prevent a successful reclaim of the cash from the paying bank.

MalMonroe

You are being made the scapegoat here. Your job is not senior, you are on probation, an error occurred. It wasn't your fault. But who's the fall guy? You are. This is absolutely disgusting and if I were attending a similar 'disciplinary' hearing (how dare they??!!!) I'd be making the point that I'd be suing them if they even considered dismissing me for this. When a person is on probation, it's up to senior management to keep an eye on things and ensure that errors are not made. Sounds like they just left everything to you and then when it all went pear shaped, oops, who shall we blame? New guy, of course. 

I'm guessing you aren't in a union? But you do need some help here, I'd contact Acas and ask their advice, it's a free service and you'll lose nothing by just asking. https://www.acas.org.uk/contact

I can't believe you are being treated in this way. I believe Americans would call you 'a Patsy'. I wouldn't want to work for this load of crooks anyway but you can't let them get away with using you like this. Once they fire you of course, the matter will be finished. Do not let it happen!

Dox

MalMonroe said:

You are being made the scapegoat here. Your job is not senior, you are on probation, an error occurred. It wasn't your fault. But who's the fall guy? You are. This is absolutely disgusting and if I were attending a similar 'disciplinary' hearing (how dare they??!!!) I'd be making the point that I'd be suing them if they even considered dismissing me for this. 

Suing them for what, exactly? All very well huffing and puffing, but the employer would be well within their rights to dismiss if they chose to do so, given the short length of OP's service.  Really not helpful to have this sort of OTT reply (however much I agree with you about the scapegoat element).

Undervalued

MalMonroe said:

You are being made the scapegoat here. Your job is not senior, you are on probation, an error occurred. It wasn't your fault. But who's the fall guy? You are. This is absolutely disgusting and if I were attending a similar 'disciplinary' hearing (how dare they??!!!) I'd be making the point that I'd be suing them if they even considered dismissing me for this. When a person is on probation, it's up to senior management to keep an eye on things and ensure that errors are not made. Sounds like they just left everything to you and then when it all went pear shaped, oops, who shall we blame? New guy, of course. 

I'm guessing you aren't in a union? But you do need some help here, I'd contact Acas and ask their advice, it's a free service and you'll lose nothing by just asking. https://www.acas.org.uk/contact

I can't believe you are being treated in this way. I believe Americans would call you 'a Patsy'. I wouldn't want to work for this load of crooks anyway but you can't let them get away with using you like this. Once they fire you of course, the matter will be finished. Do not let it happen!

And how exactly would you do that with less that two years service and no suggestion (as far as we know) of unlawful discrimination?

The OP is lucky that they are bothering to hold a disciplinary hearing. That may mean that the firm are willing to look at this objectively and listen properly to his mitigation. If so, throwing meaningless threats about is the quickest way to get shown the door.

TELLIT01

Under no circumstances should anybody start throwing threats around during a meeting like this, particularly a person in a situation where they have few employment rights.  Stick to the facts, nothing more nor less.

Malthusian

Undervalued said:

The OP is lucky that they are bothering to hold a disciplinary hearing. That may mean that the firm are willing to look at this objectively and listen properly to his mitigation. If so, throwing meaningless threats about is the quickest way to get shown the door.

Or, to be pessimistic, dismissal may be a done deal and the purpose of a disciplinary hearing is to establish whether they can stick them for the £5k.

As I understand it, the employer has not actually demanded the OP repay the £5k, they have only stated that they could be found liable if there has been negligence, which is just a statement of legal fact.

I agree that it seems unlikely the OP would be found liable for the £5k. The time zone thing is barely a yellow flag (the customer might have been on holiday) and as others have said the evidence of Photoshop could have come from a poor quality scan. A noticeable change in writing style plus the other two factors, could possibly constitute negligence for not spotting - but neither the senior nor the accounts team noticed it either, which suggests not.

The OP should relax, attend the disciplinary and stick to the facts.

FBaby

The fact you had no training in regards to counter fraud would have been your strongest defense. 

Sadly as you have been employed under 2 years, they don't have to be fair and indeed make an example of you to 'train' others. 

Still there is adisciplinary, so use it as having nothing to lose. Make sure to say that you've learned from the error and now would be the least likely staff to fail to pick up fraudulent actions.

eamon

It could well be that the letter from  his employer is a "cover all bases" letter. Its possible that the OP is being invited just to tell his role/function in the transaction. As with other posters stick to the facts and tell them how you do your job.