How to catch a thief at work?

[User12944829]

DH is being robbed silly at work - over 20 TVs were taken in one hit last month which is the biggest hit yet but hundreds, near thousands of pounds worth of inventory is going missing every month. It's definitely staff due to access restrictions. Unfortunately three different departments all have access to where these items were, the managers of these departments have all been in their roles for years and he doesn't imagine it'd be them, more likely a member of the extensive teams, but he's concerned to go to them to say to keep an eye on their staff incase it is them and he's given away that he knows. He wants to try and catch them to make sure they are fired and hopefully charged rather than they secretly get wind and just stop stealing and remain employed here, but can't afford this much loss whilst trying to gather evidence. Very limited budget wise to what new measures he can bring it to tackle it. What would you do?

@Endofthelinefinally. As they say, who watches security?.

@LordWheresMyShoes.
The staff who had access on that particular day were wanded down. One of the staff had the smart water on her from the particular item that had been treated with it. There was no reason for anyone to have touched the item at all. It had been deliberately placed out of anyone's way, so they didn't have to touch it to move it out of the way etc.
When the police searched her home it was a real treasure trove of stolen stuff.

Every entrance was security coded, thefts happened at night and weekends, eventually the penny dropped that the thieves knew the door codes. It was mainly computers and telephones. Eventually, everything had to be literally chained to walls and floors.
Even then, a couple of big screens were removed using bolt cutters.

Sounds really bad, action definitely needed. If you want to catch them, and can’t afflrd to upgrade the whole grounds in terms of security & technology.

Perhaps buy an ‘upgraded’ set of tech for a couple of caravans, and equip with cameras & smart waters, then wait...

But longer term you need tighter procedures, and bolts for the TVs etc.

The OP said there was a thousand vans and it wasn’t just TVs going missing.

I think you need a secure fence around the site and checks on cars and vans leaving the site.

I remember years ago going to my regular hairdressers (a high end chain) and every staff member was new. When I asked where the old staff members were it turned out they had been sacked due to suspected theft. Head office couldn't prove which one individual was stealing so had let every staff member go from that branch. I was shocked but it worked as a good preventative measure to the rest of the branches I suppose!

I'd bring in a new member of staff on that level, one with a supposed slightly dodgy history to get comfoortable then do a bit of poking around.

If your DH was really serious about stopping the thieves he would have invested in cctv a long time ago or brought in a security firm..

And dont listen t all this abut who you should be suspecting mre. Theft of this kind always turns out to be absolutely anybody, the only people I wuld pay more attention to is security who would have an easier job at it.

I think it would be really easy for somebody to do it from off site as well.

I was thinking Ex employee is a possibility. I’m not sure how secure the site is though.

I agree with a PP, 20 tellies aren't going home with the culprit- check selling sites for very similar items.

It's too much of free-for-all with inadequate procedures and policies if there is so much theft. There shouldn't be such open access to empty vans for starters.