Stealing from your employer?

[agnes!]

All of the time. I'm in management in a large food manufacturing company. We have cameras installed everywhere but they still manage to find ways to steal. My personal favorites are the barbeque sauce stored in the electrical panel (they stash it there until they can get it out to their cars without being seen) and the 50 pound wheels of parmesan cheese. We still can't figure out how they are hauling those huge wheels of cheese out without it showing on the cameras.

Entire 50 pound wheels of genuine Parmesan? Hmmmm...I can think of two ways they're doing the deed.

1)If keeping the wheels intact isn't important, then there is some way that they are processing them inside the facility. They're just cutting the darn things into smaller chunks *or* they're grating it somewhere, all within the building and then taking the altered cheese out in ziploc bags.

2)If keeping the wheels intact *is* important, then the thieves are putting the wheels into doubled/tripled garbage bags and the wheels are being carefully tossed out in the trash and later are being retrieved from the dumpster. I'd secretly have cameras put on the loading docks/trash areas to see if a particular group of people (this can't be just one person) are oddly interested in the trash.

A couple of thoughts...
*How many wheels are disappearing each week/month/quarter/year? Genuine Parmesan cheese is expensive, is this getting to the level of a felony? (because of the total value of what's going missing).
*Is there a pattern to when the wheels are disappearing? Are they disappearing at the end of the month when money might be tight, or only once a year but just when there is some big Italian food festival in a nearby neighborhood? Does someone who has access, do they (or a close family-member) own a deli or food-store?
*Depending on your set-up and how much is being stolen, you might think about putting the wheels under actual lock & key (even if only temporarily). Make the items limited-access, maybe put them in a cage (like some places do for cigarettes) and people have to sign the items out only with a purchase order or work order.

And, sheesh, how much cheese can people actually eat?

agnes!

 

[mrodgers]

Seriously, who could honestly eat a 5lb bag of heath chunks?

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[cat83]

Wow, these are amusing actually. Sad and amusing.

I know of one manager in a retail store who was having friends/relatives come in for "refunds" on his shift, and it all went back onto his credit card. They caught him- I'm sure it was pretty easy to notice the pattern of the same card consistently being refunded.

As for the toilet paper- I guess if it was someone who would not normally do this, *maybe* it was a one time thing- they knew they absolutely were out at home and needed it just this once? I can't imagine $.50 of toilet paper ever adding up to much over time.. unless they steal all sorts of supplies on a constant basis.

Oh! I forgot! Back in high school, I had a friend who wanted to travel to see her boyfriend, but couldn't afford it.
She worked in fast food, before cards were used so often for small purchases (this only worked with cash)

She would work in drive through, quote people their totals, and then before they made it to the window, she would add a coupon to their order. She calculated the difference between the new amounts in her head, and pocketed the change from the cash.

I gave her so much guilt for it, and couldn't believe she wasn't caught. I had also worked fast food when I was in HS, and knew that I was constantly on camera, and that coupons were kept track of! I really don't know how she got away with frequently making change for herself and pocketing it, and not having the coupons to show for it. But she made away with hundreds over a period of time!

 

[lovetoscrap]

Just have to ask the OP-- did you actually see her leave the building with the TP or just the bathroom? I ask because as someone with terrible allergies I have been known to use quite a bit of TP if I run out of kleenex. If it was a really bad day and I had work to do I would probably just take a whole roll to my desk so I wasn't having to go back and forth.

So if you remove the TP from the bathroom but still intend to use it in the office for a fairly legitimate purpose, is it stealing?

 

[Carnie]

Seriously, who could honestly eat a 5lb bag of heath chunks?

 

[dawson5]

<shudder> All I can think of is my teeth probably crying from that amount of heath chunks.

Similar to one of the PP's stories, worked with a kid who would ring up an order and cancel it, charge the people and pocket the money. He eventually was caught. Also gave his buddies all kinds of slushies for free. This always happened in the drive-thru. It was harder to monitor that area.

For a short while after my oldest was born, I worked at a Dillards. One lady who worked in the cosmetics counter would have her daughter come in and buy clothes (using her credit card to boot, you got 20% off by using it). She would change the prices. Her daughter was walking out with thousands of dollars worth of clothes for pennies on the dollar. I think the thing that tipped it all off was her credit card was being used while she was working, which was a big no-no.

 

[OhMari]

This thread reminds me of a lady I know that wracked up $60,000 in credit card bills. She would purchase items, and then take them back to the store. This is when the store gave you the choice of cash, or credit back to your credit card. She took the cash. It took her 10 years to accumulate the $60,000. Her daughter found out she did this when her mom divorced her dad. Her dad ended up with the credit card bills because the credit cards were only in his name.

 

[Mimi1965]

Just have to ask the OP-- did you actually see her leave the building with the TP or just the bathroom? I ask because as someone with terrible allergies I have been known to use quite a bit of TP if I run out of kleenex. If it was a really bad day and I had work to do I would probably just take a whole roll to my desk so I wasn't having to go back and forth.

?

He brought it to his desk
half hour later he went outside with a paper bag same size as toilet paper & came right back inside without it
(Our dumpster is locked)
AND-we work right next door to Walmart-so he could have bought some there

He smokes and drinka a lot-so there IS $$ for that
I think he just didnt feel like shopping that day

 

[Anna_Marie]

I worked in a hotel once. We had a front desk girl fired for stealing the breakfast bar donuts. Apparently she would bring in a large purse, and when taking her break she would sneak in the supply room by the bathroom and take a box.

 

[southernbohemian]

Once, when I was working as a server in college, a lot of my fellow employees started quitting to go to work in another restaurant. It was an all-you-can eat type restaurant, so I questioned one of my friends about why they would switch, since the tips at the restaurant we worked at were so much better. Turns out that that restaurant wasn't fully computerized and servers were stealing hundreds of dollars a shift.

A family of 4 would come in the restaurant and order 4 all-you-can eat buffets for $20 a pop. At the end, the server would write out two tickets - a bill for the family $80, and a bill they turned in at the end of their shift which only had 2 meals on it = $40. I was flabbergasted that the restaurant 1.) didn't notice that other all-you-can eat restaurants always have you pay at the door for this very same reason, and 2.) didn't notice all the theft.

 

[Disney Doll]

i had a co-worker in social services that embezzled tens of thousands of dollars. it was caught a few months after she quit (to go to a prestigious law school on a cush scholarship). she was not a plesant person to work with (rude) and had ticked off some of the welfare fraud staff from the d/a's office that we routinely worked with, so when she was arrested they opted instead of doing it at her home, to show up with the cops in the middle of one of her law classes yup, no advance notice to the university-the cops just show up with a couple of the welfare fraud investigators, march up to her in one of the huge classrooms and announce in a loud voice "julie x, you are under arrest for ...." and start realing off charge after charge after charge-then cuff her, read her rights and hauled her away.

she ended up doing 2 or 3 years in one of the nastier federal prisons (along side some of the same clients she used to serve-and whom she had treated even worse than those of us she worked with).

That probably wasn't pretty.

 

[cm8]

That probably wasn't pretty.

I think you are right!

 

[ForTheLoveofDisney]

Just have to ask the OP-- did you actually see her leave the building with the TP or just the bathroom? I ask because as someone with terrible allergies I have been known to use quite a bit of TP if I run out of kleenex. If it was a really bad day and I had work to do I would probably just take a whole roll to my desk so I wasn't having to go back and forth.

So if you remove the TP from the bathroom but still intend to use it in the office for a fairly legitimate purpose, is it stealing?

I've done this. I ran out of tissues and in our bathroom, the janitorial staff takes off the almost used roll and puts a new roll on the dispenser leaving all these 80% used rolls sitting on top of the new rolls. I had to grab one of the used rolls and bring it back to my desk.

Oh, and one time in a pinch, I'll be honest, I did take one of those 80%, almost used up, rolls home with me because we were OUT of toilet paper and I could NOT go out of my way that day to get to a store (I don't pass any one the way home).

 

[Arielle22]

I have had employees steal TP. The owner saw the longest term employee (40 yrs) taking rolls to her car. He didn't want to say anything to her so he had me instruct the maintenance man to start locking it up.

She made a good salary but she was cheap. When we had company dinners she would bring tupperware to take home extras.

At the same position we had a sales manager (who had just married the CEO's daughter) walked out in hand cuffs for theft. The office was not surprised since we had caught him eating our lunches from the fridge.

 

[wdwmom0f3]

i had a co-worker in social services that embezzled tens of thousands of dollars. it was caught a few months after she quit (to go to a prestigious law school on a cush scholarship). she was not a plesant person to work with (rude) and had ticked off some of the welfare fraud staff from the d/a's office that we routinely worked with, so when she was arrested they opted instead of doing it at her home, to show up with the cops in the middle of one of her law classes yup, no advance notice to the university-the cops just show up with a couple of the welfare fraud investigators, march up to her in one of the huge classrooms and announce in a loud voice "julie x, you are under arrest for ...." and start realing off charge after charge after charge-then cuff her, read her rights and hauled her away.

she ended up doing 2 or 3 years in one of the nastier federal prisons (along side some of the same clients she used to serve-and whom she had treated even worse than those of us she worked with).

She deserved that!

Well, my boss who embezzled money was only fired. She had stolen over 40K, and was never even arrested. Supposedly she was going to pay it back or something, but I never heard anymore about it.They kept it quite. She went on to work for an Ins. company. I thought that was ridiculous. If you steal money, you should go to jail or something. There needs to be some kind of record of it to protect future employers.

 

[C.Ann]

I've done this. I ran out of tissues and in our bathroom, the janitorial staff takes off the almost used roll and puts a new roll on the dispenser leaving all these 80% used rolls sitting on top of the new rolls. I had to grab one of the used rolls and bring it back to my desk.

Oh, and one time in a pinch, I'll be honest, I did take one of those 80%, almost used up, rolls home with me because we were OUT of toilet paper and I could NOT go out of my way that day to get to a store (I don't pass any one the way home).

Or the person may have actually asked permission ahead of time - but that wouldn't fit in with the direction of these kinds of threads, would it? LOL..

 

[Mimi1965]

Or the person may have actually asked permission ahead of time - but that wouldn't fit in with the direction of these kinds of threads, would it? LOL..

I can NOT imagine "asking permission" to take home Toilet paper.

(as i said-he took it out in a sneaky sort of way-and we work right next to walmart)

 

[C.Ann]

I can NOT imagine "asking permission" to take home Toilet paper.

(as i said-he took it out in a sneaky sort of way-and we work right next to walmart)

Desperate times call for desperate measures..LOL Maybe he asked, maybe he didn't - only he knows for sure..

As I said previously, I didn't even steal "time" from my employers.. However, I did ask the doctor I worked for if I could have a bunch of pens that one certain pharm. rep always brought in (I'm picky about my pens) and she always said, "Yes - take as many as you want.." But - I never asked in front of the entire office staff.. I would take a handful of them, go into my office, and put them in my purse.. Maybe the rest of the office staff thought I was stealing too.. Now that I think back on it, they probably did..

Just saying there's two sides to every story.. It sounds like a very odd thing to steal - one roll of TP???

 

[tvguy]

We had a payroll clerk that was skimming approved overtime pay off , and somehow diverting it to herself. Never more than 1/4 hour per person, and usually only people who had large amounts of overtime so they wouldn't notice they were missing a 1/4 hour of pay. She was skimming $2,000 a month this way.

 

[MM27]

When I worked my first job (retail) there was a phone line to report any internal theft that was witnessed. I called on another employee because he was openly bragging about how he would buy items in our store after illegally marking the tickets down to really low prices and then he would rip those price stickers off and return the items for a store credit in another state where his family lived. I actually got a check for $200 for reporting him. It would've been more, but another person also called and reported him and they split the reward between the two of us. He was fired.

In that same job, I saw several people brought out in handcuffs. I don't know why anyone thought they would be able to get away with stealing because on the first day of working there, the security team did a whole presentation to the new employees, they took us for a tour that included a stop in their offices where you could see the camera shots from the store on monitors.