Are My Employees Stealing From Me?

As a business owner or manager, it’s up to you to make sure you hire, train, and lead your employees to help your business grow Unfortunately, not every employee hired is going to be completely dedicated to your company. Some of these employees will even go as far as to steal from right underneath your nose.

Sudden Change in Work Habits

You can usually get a pretty good grasp of an employee's work habits after a few months. You’ll know what time they usually arrive, leave, take breaks, and how they act during their shift. If all of a sudden an employee starts coming in early or staying late for no apparent reason, take a mental note. Look into why their work habits suddenly changed just to make sure there’s nothing going on behind your back.

Missing Inventory

Most of the time, you’re the person doing all of the ordering for your inventory. If not, you should at least be looking at shipping orders and knowing a rough estimate of your total inventory. When your inventory system is telling you that there are five units of a specific item, but only three or four are in the store, start digging. Find out where the missing units are by seeing if they were damaged out, sitting in the return area, or misplaced. If this becomes a normally occurring theme, start asking questions.

Friends & Family

It takes a lot of sneaking around for an employee to steal and can oftentimes be very difficult. Many employees (who do steal) will enlist the help of friends and family. If an employee has their relative or buddy come in every so often, but will only check out with them — keep an eye out. When this person always waits on their long line instead of going to an open register, you have the right to be a little suspicious.

It’s not always easy to tell if your employees are stealing from you, but there are a few red flags you should be aware of. If you’re thinking about installing CCTV security cameras to cut down on employee theft and shoplifting, contact Reliable Voice & Data Systems. To learn more, or to schedule a free estimate, give us a call at (877) 385-6657.

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