Employee claiming hours on her day off while working a full day elsewhere

[dodgylady23]

I manage one staff member. She’s casual and until recently another person (friend of hers) was signing her timesheets off.

For a number of reasons, not least of which being this employee is hopeless and has an attitude problem, I suspected something fishy with her timesheets so had them (rightfully) signed over to me.

She works four days with us and one day elsewhere. I had to insist multiple times that she add this regular day off to her calendar to indicate she was off. I’ve approved a few of her timesheets now, but just noticed she has claimed to have worked six hours for me on the day she works a full day elsewhere - her agreed day off from here.

Queried this with her only to have her get very defensive and claim she had urgent work to do here so managed to do both. She mentioned working on one thing (not at all urgent and a quick task) and “other bits and pieces”. She said she would send through evidence of her work if need be.

1. I didn’t authorise her to work on that day
2. This “urgent” work could have waited until the next day, or any number of days in the weeks ahead before it became urgent.
3. It’s impossible to work two jobs simultaneously.

AIBU to outright reject those additional hours and give her an award for biggest pisstaker of the year?

YABU for having a policy allowing friend to confirm each others time sheets wtf. Sack her.

You might want to check your employer's policy about posting identifiable information about employees online.

It's usually misconduct so you might want to ask MN to delete this thread.

Where has the OP posted identifiable information about anyone? I have no idea their name, age, what company they work for, what part of the world they live in...

Eh?

Probably but double check with the bosses as accusing someone wrongfully will not end well..

I mean, I ant understand how there can be a genuine reason for her claim but always good to be cautious.

I would also be talking to the person who signed off her timesheets before you took over. Pisstakers ruin it for honest workers.

Even Miss Marple is going to struggle to identify someone from indentifuable information

What kind of jobs are these? Do they need to be done during set hours? Is there any chance she could have done both?

Sounds like your organisation needs to tighten up its procedures, how are casual employees able to determine that they can do extra?

What is the agreement with assigning her work?

I'm fairly clear she's taking the piss, but arguably, it is at least possible for her to complete 6 hours work on a day she is working elsewhere.

The issues for me, are whether the additional hours were authorised and whether there is anything in her contract stating that any additional hours must be agreed in advance.

I'd make sure that I'd have a water tight counter argument ready and say that you're ending her contract with immediate effect. If she goes after saying "But I'm owed 3 months money" or similar you should be able to counter that by saying "We've checked your past timesheets and, let's just say, that you've already received/been paid for whatever time you would have been working for us because of these X number of days that we're discussing here." (have the actual number of days she would be owed, minus however many days are suspect on her timesheets).

I think that would be best if she left with immediate effect. I'd even make sure that a colleague escorted her to her locker and only allowed her to take what is actually hers. All office equipment must be returned immediately.

I would be moving towards termination now. But considering this is your staff member and indeed your only staff member, you should have been on top of this much sooner anyway.

This is not an employee. Asking a contractor to justify their hours is not problematic, and in fact there should be regular spot checks.

Sounds like she’s committed fraud to me.

Rumbled but she's probably thought ahead and is going to try and talk her way out of it .

She will be scrabbling around now trying to justify this. as a previous post said, can you check computer entries?

Hopefully if she has any sense she will resign and then go sick until her notice period is up .

It doesn't actually matter you can't just decide you will work on your day off

Where did I say it was an employee?

Maybe just reread it? With contractors, it is standard to verify hours and where time is spent. It would only be potentially problematic with an employee where correct procedures need to be followed.

Few answers to catch up on.

She’s logged the hours within the 9-5 period she’s working the other job, so has not worked these outside of usual hours. Even if she had, making it possible to have done both, I can’t see how she can block the entire day off, tell me she won’t be working, yet submit hours anyway. This was not agreed on.

For those who say it’s my fault for not checking earlier, I’m relatively new to the organisation. She has been there longer and my role was created as we’re expanding. It made sense that her time sheets were signed off by this other person until then.

I asked for this to change earlier, multiple times. And now I have the job of going back over old time sheets to check exactly what she’s been paid for. Make no mistake though. I’ll be going over them with a fine-tooth comb. She’s taken an awful lot of days off sick, for example.

Also, not a minimum wage job. Not that it matters. Given she’s casual she earns a much higher rate as well. It’s about what I earn. Only I actually work for my pay.

I once terminated someone's probation for falsifying her time sheets (claiming 30 minutes lunch breaks when they were at least an hour). HR advised I couldn't sack the established staff member who told her to do it ('as everybody does it') but only give a final written warning. Riot act well and truly read to all staff.

Thanks for this @PhulNana . I’m interested to hear other posters’ similar stories.

When I was in the Civil Service we had an HEO sacked for clocking back in from lunch and then spending an hour in the free gym, for weeks and weeks. Getting pissed in the Wetherspoons next door till 2 PM on Fridays and practically sleeping until the end of core flexi time at 3.30 was OK though.

Of course, the other thing you could do is contact her other employer, to check that it is correct that she was working for you instead of them on those dates...
(I wonder if she swapped her day at the other employer some weeks and that's why she took the sick days?)

Talking to the other employer might at least be something to mention as a possibility if she won't come clean on her timesheets for you. She might want to avoid losing two jobs.

Consider whether it's time well spent. I'd simply pay up, tell her not to work on the day off again without your permission, then not renew her contract.