Employees . Ugh!!!!

[djetok]

So , I have an employee , truck driver , that got a DUI in his personal vehicle. With this issue and other issues, I was regretting the talk about letting him go. My office team reconciled the fuel receipts and found this.

Not the awkward conversation now. The funny thing is though if he would have asked I would have helped him out. My first thought was maybe he used it as a mistake. The only problem with that line of thought is, he turned in the receipt after the weekend and he was off work when it happened.

 

[Julian]

My office team reconciled the fuel receipts and found this.

Perhaps he misunderstood "fuel".....the coolers and pizza were fueling him!

My company now has a fulltime person on staff to review expense reports for fraud. So far approx 5 people have had to resign for fraudulent expense reporting (they resign or we threaten prosecution-they always resign)

 

[Mainah]

Years ago on my way back from a week long work trip my wife asked me to stop and pick up milk on my way home from the airport. My corp card was still in the front of my wallet (minimalist wallet guy) and sure enough I swiped it by accident at the grocery store but instantly knew when I was putting it away. I went to the customer service desk and “returned” the milk to buy it on my own card. The credit turned out be worse to expense because of the system we were using at the time and I had to write a letter of explanation for the credit but not the debit. Was a serious pain.

Point being that honest mistakes do happen.

Keep in mind the items on that receipt marked cooler from a convenience store may have come out of a cooler that is stocked by distributors .... think singles, tall boys, and 40s. I don’t know the employee but that person may not only deserve to be let go but may also need substance abuse help. Not the employers responsibility but getting let go combined with possible other issues can lead to bad things. Depending on the relationship and laws may not be a bad idea to make sure there is someone to look out. Of course look out for yourself first and make sure someone else is present when you deliver the news.

 

[Julian]

make sure someone else is present when you deliver the news

But always WAY better to get the employee to formally resign in writing on their own vs firing them!

 

[djetok]

Years ago on my way back from a week long work trip my wife asked me to stop and pick up milk on my way home from the airport. My corp card was still in the front of my wallet (minimalist wallet guy) and sure enough I swiped it by accident at the grocery store but instantly knew when I was putting it away. I went to the customer service desk and “returned” the milk to buy it on my own card. The credit turned out be worse to expense because of the system we were using at the time and I had to write a letter of explanation for the credit but not the debit. Was a serious pain.

Point being that honest mistakes do happen.

Keep in mind the items on that receipt marked cooler from a convenience store may have come out of a cooler that is stocked by distributors .... think singles, tall boys, and 40s. I don’t know the employee but that person may not only deserve to be let go but may also need substance abuse help. Not the employers responsibility but getting let go combined with possible other issues can lead to bad things. Depending on the relationship and laws may not be a bad idea to make sure there is someone to look out. Of course look out for yourself first and make sure someone else is present when you deliver the news.

you are most like right about the cooler comment. I didnt think about that. 7.99 is about the cost of a 12 pack of beer
Yeah , I am doing a deep dive on receipts st the moment. There are several receipts that dont add up. They typically get fuel at 100 gallons at a time with 150 gallon tanks. But I am seeing diesel receipts for 50-60 dollars.

 

[djetok]

But always WAY better to get the employee to formally resign in writing on their own vs firing them!

Oklahoma is a "at will " state. If he files for unemployment, I will respond with theft and proof and he will be denied on the spot.

 

[Murf'n'surf]

Fuel receipts should be turned in with mileage written on them. That way you can backtrack fuel amounts compared to miles driven.

 

[Whisky]

Haha, @Mainah that reminds me of a similar story.

I have done the wrong card and returned before also, which like you say confuses the crap out of our auditors.

The worst one for me though was: Went out and bought groceries one day, charged it walked away and didn't give it much thought. Later that month when reconciling my expense report I caught the issue! I had charged the whole bill to my company card! Luckily, our company had a pretty easy process for correcting this where we just marked it personal and they debit our account for us. But oh man did I sweat bullets over that one at first!

To make matters worse, at that time, both cards were the same colour, and I thought I was being smart by setting them both to the same PIN. Learned that lesson the hard way haha!

 

[Whisky]

@djetok Not sure if it helps for the future, but we have a program where our company vehicles have a card in them that can only be used for fuel/vehicle related supplies (like washer fluid/car washes). If an employee tries (or accidentally) charges anything else to the card it is rejected. Most stations support this program, though there are one or two where the system lets things slide though unintentionally.

 

[djetok]

Fuel receipts should be turned in with mileage written on them. That way you can backtrack fuel amounts compared to miles driven.

Yeah they do mileage on their log sheets.

 

[djetok]

@djetok Not sure if it helps for the future, but we have a program where our company vehicles have a card in them that can only be used for fuel/vehicle related supplies (like washer fluid/car washes). If an employee tries (or accidentally) charges anything else to the card it is rejected. Most stations support this program, though there are one or two where the system lets things slide though unintentionally.

Yeah I used to run fuel man at both of my businesses but the fees got stupid. I use a corporate card now and all 26 employees have there own card and the credit card has all their expenses separated per card as well. It works out well for me since I payoff a 100k per month and get the rewards

 

[Whisky]

Yeah I used to run fuel man at both of my businesses but the fees got stupid. I use a corporate card now and all 26 employees have there own card and the credit card has all their expenses separated per card as well. It works out well for me since I payoff a 100k per month and get the rewards

That makes sense! It's hard to beat the rewards on 100k/month of credit card charges!

 

[2kwik4u]

I've been doing travel recently for the company and have learned a TON about both how much and how little they care about the expense report.

Drove to Texarkana from Louisville awhile back in my personal vehicle. Charged the company mileage, but used the company card to buy gas. Sounds like double dipping except our expense reports have a specific column for that. So it take my mileage, multiplies by rate (currently (0.585), then subtracts fuel from that and credits me the remainder. Boss didn't know this existed and we ended up in about 3 meetings, culminating with the CFO to review the process and make sure everyone was on the same page. Nobody was upset at any level, just turned out about 1/2 the company didn't realize it worked this way despite being very specific in the documentation on how to fill out expense reports (which apparantly was written about 5 years after anyone in that group had started)

Next 3 trips I thought I would be smart and fly down. Bought upgraded seats so I could have easy change of time/date to depart. When I did have to change the flight, all kinds of odd returns came back on the card, then were charged again. yet another 3-4 meetings for them to figure out why I had 12 transactions (some credits, some debits) for a single trips worth of plane tickets. To make those matters worse American wasn't great about getting me reciepts for most of that, so I was printing confirmation emails with time stamps. It was a mess.

The best one yet though was my rental of a storage unit in Texarkana without asking the boss first. Was down there on a Friday, and before I could leave I got a call from the customer "How soon can you be back". Well I had two pelicans of tools with me that I was going to check through as baggage. Instead of paying for the checked bag fees to get them home, and then back to TXK, adn then home again. I just went down the street from the hotel and rented a 8x10 storage unit for a month. Cost $45 for the unit, and $12 for a lock. Saved the company probably $500 or more in bag fees. Once I explained the situation and the reasoning I got a pat on the back, but leading up to that there were some serious tense moments with one of the accountants making statements about defrauding the company and such.

It's fun times for certain!

 

[Ancient canoe]

Do what you have to do regarding the DUI, but a $15 error doesn't really scream fraud unless it's one of many.

 

[djetok]

Do what you have to do regarding the DUI, but a $15 error doesn't really scream fraud unless it's one of many.

You are correct. The office has found more than this one. Hell, everyone that has worked with me for a while knows that if they would have asked. I would have pulled cash out of my wallet and gave it to them. This just makes it easier for me, I know I cannot trust him. I am not pressing fraud on him, he will just be relieved of his duties for cause.

 

[Whisky]

Don't feel bad about letting under preforming and untrustworthy employees go when appropriate. I fully agree that it is important to support your team and as you say, will always go above and beyond for mine, but when issues cannot be resolved and trust cannot be returned, it is important for the health of the company and for the health of the team to let those individuals go.

As you say, sometimes you already know it has to be done, and plan to do it, but little things like this just help to make the decision and the discussion easier!

 

[swatski]

If the is no trust, there is not much that can be done. Otherwise a “last chance agreement” can sometimes be crafted. If you want to keep the person employed.

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[Rumbo]

If the is no trust, there is not much that can be done. Otherwise a “last chance agreement” can sometimes be crafted. If you want to keep the person employed.

—

Doesn’t work with a cdl driver with a dui though. That is an automatic cdl revocation/suspension.

 

[Trevor Shipman]

You are correct. The office has found more than this one. Hell, everyone that has worked with me for a while knows that if they would have asked. I would have pulled cash out of my wallet and gave it to them. This just makes it easier for me, I know I cannot trust him. I am not pressing fraud on him, he will just be relieved of his duties for cause.

Agree here, it’s not the amount it’s the fact they knew it was wrong.

 

[djetok]

Doesn’t work with a cdl driver with a dui though. That is an automatic cdl revocation/suspension.

Well it's not automatic but it's a lot of money to keep it. This issue solidified my decision that I was not going to help him.


This whole deal of me letting him go was going to happen. In oklahoma there are 2 issues with dealing with a DUI. 1st is the criminal side and charged with it and fighting it. 2nd is the civil side where the person is to contact dps. They have 15 days after arrest to contact Department of Public Safety. My contact at DPS has informed me that he has not contacted them as of yet. He has until this Monday to setup a hearing with DPS. If he does not contact DPS in 15 days his license is in revocation. He loses his class D and his class A. In order to get his cdl back he has to retake the written and driving test. Just like he never had one.