Internal thefts - setting up a honey trap

[amaze]

Hi,

We are suffering from internal thefts of products from our warehouse. I want to get someone on the "inside" and see what is actually really going on. I have a friend who would be excellent for this and he is happy to help and pretend to be an employee for a week or so, get friendly with the staff and see who is actually "thieving" and maybe even create a "honey trap".

What are people's thoughts on this and any other legal implications?

Thanks

[VendingRevolution]

I don't know the legal implications, if it were me, I would do it and I hope you catch the thief(s).

If someone is stealing from you, you have to do what it takes to catch the thief.

We have caught people stealing cash and stock from us over the years - we get VERY heavy and involve the Police where necessary.

What kind of items are they stealing from you?

Let us know how you get on.

Regards.

Barbara

[Zeno]

Very dodgy ground I suspect. I do not think that such evidence could be used in court at least.

I suspect your friend would need to be an employee for more than a week before the other staff will trust him.

[ServersandSpares]

Have you tried pricing up a hidden camera. They can be very good quality images, easy to install for a short period of time or how ever long you like.

If you do catch them, make sure you don't involve the police before you terminate their employment when you get the evidence, or I believe you have to then suspend them pending inquiry, and this is on full pay, you might want to get this clarified.

Julie

[Delta-SI]

To what end do you want to catch your thief?

I mean would you be happy with catching and sacking them or would you want to take them to court.

[KM-Tiger]

As it happens I know someone who used to do this for a living, an ex-policeman who worked for an agency who would send him to various companies where he would 'work' as a casual employee for a week or two.

He said it was easy, you just keep your head down and sooner or later someone will tell you what's going on.

[Steve2507]

Is your warehouse covered with cctv?

If not you could get it installed as it may stop the thefts and may help lower the cost of your insurance.

[SLF]

Even using a person to get inside info, you will need evidence. CCTV is the best you cna hope for unless catching them red-handed. You could also introduce random bag checks. what are the products going missing? large or small?

[dingbat]

Stick hidden cameras in there. This is one of the reasons I fear employing people. A friend of mine has been running a retail business for many years and at least half of his employees have stolen from him.

[PI Guy]

is the friend a professional? if not dont use them.

[Chippie]

Hi,

We are suffering from internal thefts of products from our warehouse. I want to get someone on the "inside" and see what is actually really going on. I have a friend who would be excellent for this and he is happy to help and pretend to be an employee for a week or so, get friendly with the staff and see who is actually "thieving" and maybe even create a "honey trap".

What are people's thoughts on this and any other legal implications?

Thanks

I have a very close friend who is the FD of a furniture retailer. They had exactly this problem and caught the guy red handed, got the police involved, recovered the furniture and got rid of the guy. If you'd like a chat, pm me and I'll clear it with her. If she's happy to help I'll give her your details for a chat. It's important to get things right though or you could end up screwing the whole thing up. :)

[blueisgreen]

I used to do covert employee investigations. Most were for a minimum of a month, some up to 4 months living amongst a local community and working the full job spec whilst compiling a report. A bit more in-depth than the scenario above but same set up, ex police are used so evidence requirements and admissability rules are maintained. Also you needed to make sure you were a LONG WAY from home so you wouldnt be recognised by mistake, as a slip up could lead to some nasty injuries. It was most certainly not easy, it is a very exacting and precise process to be able to present that type of evidence at court. Camera evidence is very very rarely used at court as the requirements are too difficult to stick to although using covert video as a guide to obtain other forms of evidence afterwards is common. Not one single person in over 14 years of my experience was ultimately presented to court, all companies preferred to show evidence and allow the thief to "resign" as the company reputation was more important than the prosecution. It is an expensive way to get rid. Using a mate would potentially put him at risk, the value of "evidence" would probably not be good enough for court so ultimately not worth presenting as it would nothing more than one word against another and then it might backfire into a tribunal case. You cannot "Honey-trap" them like you see in the movies, it wont stand up. If you just want to show them you know to get them to leave then put in some coverts and keep it very informal without threatening a legal resolution. To get the correct type of evidence using covert employees to take them to court is very intensive/expensive

[Chippie]

Stick hidden cameras in there. This is one of the reasons I fear employing people. A friend of mine has been running a retail business for many years and at least half of his employees have stolen from him.

My god! They must have a very poor vetting/interview process!

[Esk247]

simple announce to staff that their have been a series of thefts...due to this they are asked to sign a form that allows bag/contents checks to be carried out at the discretion of security/management.

install cctv systems, but i think you may have to inform staff that you are installing this as it could be seen as invasion of privacy surely if they don't tell you you're being watched.

when i worked for the co-op we were informed of all the cctv systems and that we would have to have bags/coats checked if there had ever been a theft of private/store goods in a staff only area.

just be open and honest, the thief will either give up or just leave if the security gets so tight that they cannot do anything. perhaps you have a general idea of who it might be.

[dingbat]

My god! They must have a very poor vetting/interview process!

He doesn't have a vetting procedure. He employs practically anyone.

[Humphrey]

Be careful if you get too heavy handed with all of your employees by imposing bag searches etc. This could cause honest employees to become resentful and so reduce their productivity.
Once you identify the individual(s) concerned do not approach them straight away. Carefully gather information on 'what' they are taking and 'when', ensuring that you have clear solid evidence. Once you have gathered enough information interview them with an independent witness, show them your evidence and offer the thief the opportunity to avoid reporting to the police if they pay for / return the all goods they have taken and ensure they understand that their employment is terminated immediately. Have a document prepared which clearly states the situation and which they sigh to indicate their agreement.

You will probably be unable to get full payment for goods lost but this fair approach is often successful in resolving the problem whilst reducing the risk of the time and expense issues associated with legal action.

Humphrey

[Chippie]

He doesn't have a vetting procedure. He employs practically anyone.

Then he asks for everything he gets.

[lockie]

Then he asks for everything he gets.

I think you are being extremely unfair as there is no way you can work out if someone is a thief at interview.

I used to work alongside a guy on the london underground who has since been put inside for running britains largest car ringing gang to the tune of 4.5 million. full story here (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6710897.stm).

Does this mean the underground has a crap vetting procdure too ?

Thieves are smart and often know how to go about their business undetected.
If you could please explain the vetting technique that sniffs out a thief im sure the op would benefit greatly from this.

[Barnie]

if you do catch the person issue civil recover for some of your costs

also note down everything thats happening now, it may actualy fall into place as to who it is, plus may also be called in for evidence

i catch 1-3 people a year, and my fav method is the trap as oppose to just watching cctv

when was the last time you done a stock take

[ken_uk]

What is being stolen?

[edbk1203]

I used to work for one the large national electrical retailers.

I don't know if they still do it but random bag checks incorporating a requirement to empty out pockets were introduced at our store without objections from anyone and the thief was eventually outed.

It was introduced by way of a staff meeting in which all staff members were informed at once that this was going to have to happen in future in order to rule staff members out as part of the investigation in to what was happening to the stock that had suspicious discrepancies.

All staff members were asked to sign an authority form giving the management permission to initiate these random checks (which incidentally always involved a group of staff being searched rather than individuals - usually those that happened to be on-shift whenever the check was initiated) and were informed that they had the right to not sign the authority if they didn't agree to it.

To my knowledge (it was a short while ago now) not one of the staff members refused to sign it (presumably nobody wanted the finger of suspicion pointing at them) and as mentioned above the thief was outed a couple of weeks later.


Logically there may well be genuinely honest people who disagree with being the subject of a bag check etc but I think the vast majority of people with nothing to hide wouldn't mind at all, especially if they were aware of the financial impact on the business etc.

[dingbat]

I think you are being extremely unfair as there is no way you can work out if someone is a thief at interview.

I used to work alongside a guy on the london underground who has since been put inside for running britains largest car ringing gang to the tune of 4.5 million. full story here (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6710897.stm).

Does this mean the underground has a crap vetting procdure too ?

Thieves are smart and often know how to go about their business undetected.
If you could please explain the vetting technique that sniffs out a thief im sure the op would benefit greatly from this.

That's very true, although in my friend's case he really does employ any old Joe.
I think it's the workers who've been there the longest who are the worst offenders. I used to work in a retail chain just after college and their methods were to keep moving you around different branches to stop staff becoming too comfortable with surroundings and fellow workers.