My practice only has a handful of employees, but in the employee manual it clearly states that theft is frowned on, and the thief is subject to firing as well as prosecution. That said, we all share food. We have two refrigerators and one is “up for grabs” stuff. I stock it with fruit juice, pop, fruit, munchies, etc. Employees bring in leftovers and share with everyone via this fridge. The other fridge is for personal stuff as well as urine/stool (don’t tell OSHA).
Years ago I saw a lady with three dogs. She had a paper bag with her dog’s stool samples. When the bag was opened it was found to contain a sandwich, apples, and chips. At lunchtime her husband musta though his wife was mighty pissed off over something!
Call everyone into a meeting and have Greedy Guts stand in front of them.
“Greedy Guts has been caught stealing another employees food from the refrigerator. As this office is a precision team, his failure is your failure. Therefore, from now on whenever Greedy Guts fucks up, you will be punished. Now get down and give me 50!”
Then have GG stand and eat the food in front of everyone else.
On further consideration of the after-effects, it would probably be better to have your assistant make this announcement.
[QUOTE=Contrapuntal]
How is it assault? What if I put it in my food because I wanted it there? What if I need Ex-Lax and that is how I choose to take it?
Are banks guilty of assault when the dye pack explodes in the bank robbers’ car?
[/QUOTE]
And how if you lable with your name and even put a warning that it contains Ex-Lax how can someone possibley claim that they thought it was theirs or didn’t contain laxatives?
[QUOTE=Contrapuntal]
How is it assault? What if I put it in my food because I wanted it there? What if I need Ex-Lax and that is how I choose to take it?
Are banks guilty of assault when the dye pack explodes in the bank robbers’ car?
[/QUOTE]
Intent. As for the ‘what if I meant to eat it’, that’s something your lawyer would have to convince a jury of.
The bank puts the dye to identify the bills, not hospitalize the robbers. If you put food coloring in your decoy lunch that would stain the thief’s face and hands, the comparison would be valid.
[QUOTE=Hampshire]
I’ve personally fired a handful of people for doing it. My reasoning was that if they have no reservations about stealing from another person that they work side-by-side with, then they probably have even less reservations about stealing from the company they work for.
It’s also a moral booster for other employees knowing that their manager cares enough about them to not put up with that crap.
[/QUOTE]
A manager who looks after his or her underlings is wonderful to work for. I’ve had a couple of really great managers, and I’ve always gone the extra mile for them. When I have such a manager, my whole life is happier.
I’m in total agreement about the stealing is stealing idea. I can see getting a reprimand if it’s possibly a mistake and confessed, but for the second occurence, it should be a firing offense. I’ve worked in a couple of places where there were thieves, and it’s always on a worker’s mind.
If the thief eats food that was clearly identified as someone else’s they should be fired. If they can reasonably claim they thought the food was theirs they should be given a written warning and fired for any second offense.
[QUOTE=Wee Bairn]
Yesterday someone here swears that someone ate their 6 ounce carton of yoghurt. A group of employees reached the agrement that if caught, the perp, regardless of who it is, should be fired on the spot. I find that a bit extreme- I think the public mockery if found out would be punishment enough. Anyone agree?
And, has anyone ever had this happen at work, and the perp was caught? What happened to them?
[/QUOTE]
I think your coworkers are being short-sighted – you can only fire someone ONCE, but you can have fun with public mockery every day.
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
No. All you would have to do is convince a jury that it was stolen.
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Not sure I follow you. Setting traps that injure or endanger are a debatable legal area, even if the person targeted by the trap is doing something illegal at the time.
[QUOTE=Sublight]
Not sure I follow you. Setting traps that injure or endanger are a debatable legal area, even if the person targeted by the trap is doing something illegal at the time.
[/QUOTE]
A prosecutor would have to prove that you intended for the tainted food to be eaten by the victim. If you do nothing to invite, entice or encourage the theft, I don’t see how you could be convicted of anything.
Anyone who would steal someone’s food is a totally selfish asshole. They probably cause lots of other problems for the good people on a regular basis. Their selfish behavior probably makes it hard for other people to work together and cooperate for the common good. The company is better off without them. Fire them immediately.
Unless of course you want to try one of the funnier solutions above, then fire them anyway.
[QUOTE=Mikemike2]
Seems a new tenant in our office was running short of money and was supplementing his diet. Upon further investigation he was also living in our office, and hiding his suitcase during the day. Also all his cheques bounced. Good times.
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[QUOTE=vetbridge]
Years ago I saw a lady with three dogs. She had a paper bag with her dog’s stool samples. When the bag was opened it was found to contain a sandwich, apples, and chips. At lunchtime her husband musta though his wife was mighty pissed off over something!
[/QUOTE]
Good 'un. A couple years ago DesertRoomie and I were going to visit my Dad. DR keeps snakes, who eat frozen rats. Dad lived on the other side of town. The store offering the best price on rats was about a half mile from him. So we stopped at the store and got a half-dozen. They were individually sealed in plastic, put into a small plastic sack which was then put into a small paper sack, which we had stapled shut at the cash register. When we got to Dad’s I said, “Here, put this in the freezer, and don’t look inside.”
“What’s in it?”
“. . . Snake food.”
Of course, we forgot to recover the sack when we left and the next day, about noon, I get a phone call: “I, uh, looked in the sack . . .”
I apologized and drove there right away, negating the whole point of the exercise. Thereafter, when we did the same thing, I’d put the car keys in the freezer, too.
[QUOTE=ScareyFaerie]
Perhaps the person whose food was stolen should be the one to choose the punishment. So whoever nicked my salad last week will be in line for public flogging. Hmmm…I’m liking that idea.
In all seriousness, it is theft and should be dealt with as such.
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
A prosecutor would have to prove that you intended for the tainted food to be eaten by the victim. If you do nothing to invite, entice or encourage the theft, I don’t see how you could be convicted of anything.
[/QUOTE]
Negligence for keeping hazardous materials in a public food storage area?
“Greedy Guts has been caught stealing another employees food from the refrigerator. As this office is a precision team, his failure is your failure. Therefore, from now on whenever Greedy Guts fucks up, you will be punished. Now get down and give me 50!”
Then have GG stand and eat the food in front of everyone else.
[QUOTE=Sublight]
Not sure I follow you. Setting traps that injure or endanger are a debatable legal area, even if the person targeted by the trap is doing something illegal at the time.
[/QUOTE]
You don’t think that having something explode in your lap while you are driving a car is dangerous? Have you ever seen one of those things go off?
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