Time theft might sound like something straight out of a blockbuster science fiction movie but, the reality is, it’s a lot more sublunary and common than it sounds. And for many small businesses or franchise, the financial costs of employee time theft can be far greater than what you might initially think.
In this article we will discuss what time theft is and best measures to avoid time theft by employees in small upcoming businesses or well developed businesses. Lets discuss what time theft is.
What Is Time Theft?
Time theft occurs when an employee uses paid work time for nonwork-related activities without their employer’s authorization or permission. Despite the use of the word “theft” in its name, time theft is more commonly an employee misconduct issue rather than a case of outright employee theft. And it’s important to keep in mind that time theft is often not intentional.
For example, an employee might commit time theft unconsciously by rounding down their start time from 9:05 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. or rounding up their end time from 4:57 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. because of a mistaken belief that the rounded times are easier for management to work with or for the payroll department to process.
The Cost Consequences of Time Theft
At first glance, time theft might seem nonsignificant. For instance, taking the above example: Paying your well-intentioned employee for five minutes in the morning when they didn’t work those five minutes doesn’t look particularly consequential.
But when you do the math, the negative cost impact becomes more glaring. Let’s say this employee consistently starts work at 9:05 a.m. every workday. Taking two weeks off for holidays, those five minutes a day over the course of a full work year add up to 1,250 minutes, or 20 hours and 50 minutes, Here lets do the math’s:
5 minutes × 5 (days) × 50 (weeks) = 1,250 minutes
1,250 minutes = 20.83333 hours or 20 hours and 50 minutes
If you’re paying that employee N200 per hour, those five minutes a day amount to a yearly sum of N4160 that you’re paying for time not worked. And the costs compound if other employees are also coming in a few minutes late or leaving a few minutes early.
Is Time Theft Illegal?
There’s no federal law that makes employee time theft illegal in the Nigeria., so in the vast majority of cases, time theft is classified as employee outright misconduct rather than a crime. But an employee who commits time theft still faces the possibility of severe consequences.
For instance, in addition to disciplinary action or the termination of their job, if the employee orchestrated (planned) the time theft by falsifying their records or through some other fraudulent activity, they could face criminal charges of fraud.
In the case of catching an employee committing time theft, you might be tempted to withhold wages equal to the amount they were paid for time not spent working. It’s crucial that you resist this temptation, however, as holding back on wages constitutes wage theft and is a violation of the Fair labor standard act and regulations in the country.
Meanwhile, you could bring up a lawsuit against an employee if their time theft has resulted in a significant financial loss for you, in most cases, the best course of action is to either discipline the employee or terminate their employment in the organization altogether, and then implement preventative measures to help guard against more time theft incidents happening in the near future.
7 Major Types of Time Theft
Time theft is a challenging issue for employers around the world because there are so many ways it can occur, from the fairly innocuous extra five minutes in the example above to cases of fraud perpetrated via premeditated(Planned/Intentional) falsified timesheets or records. The list below explains some of the more common types of time theft that employers might encounter.
1. Personal, nonwork-related activities
Tackling a personal motif during work hours can be unavoidable sometimes, but when employees do this frequently or consistently—for example, answering personal calls, checking personal emails or working on a side hustle aside from their assigned task, those lost minutes accumulate over time.
2. Buddy punching
It turns out there’s a particular term to describe the practice of asking a coworker to cover for their late arrival or early departure by clocking in or out for them is described as ‘buddy punching’. Buddy punching can happen with both manual and electronic timekeeping procedures. For example, many electronic timekeeping processes assign users with PINs for signing in or out, which an employee can easily give to a coworker to clock in or out for them.
3. Inflation of work hours
This form of time theft involves anything that results in inflated work hours being reported and compensated. While an employee might do it unintentionally or unconsciously (or under a mistaken belief that it helps out the payroll department, as in the example above), inflation of work hours also includes timesheet falsification and time clock manipulation.
4. Extended or excessive breaks
Whether it’s a lunch break that extends beyond the time permitted(speculated time) or an excessive number of short breaks (with smoke breaks being a typical culprit), this type of time theft is not only common but can also be hard to detect.
5. Digital distractions and cyberslacking
Social media and web surfing(Browsing) are digital distractions that come with a double whammy: Not only does the time spent online for nonwork-related matters accumulate, it can also lead to reduced focus on the work that needs to be done and an overall decline in both productivity and work quality.
6. Intentional time wasting
This type of time theft covers a wide range of employee behavior, from taking too long to complete a project or task (sometimes resulting in otherwise unnecessary overtime) to padding the time worked on a task to stopping work early but waiting to clock out at the correct time.
6. Late arrivals and early departures
As illustrated by the numbers in the example in the previous section above, arriving a little late for work or leaving work early might look insignificant, but over time a consistent pattern of late arrivals or early departures can accumulate, especially if you have multiple employees engaging in this bad practice.
Ways To Avert Time Theft
For employers, managing time theft-related misconduct can be a problematic and challenging endeavor. The best way to combat time theft? As with a multitude of things in business and life, prevention is often the best approach. Below are best ways to tackle time theft:
1. Consider employee morale
Delighted employees tend to be productive employees. So, while time theft prevention can be effective, it can also backfire if employees find the measures to be excessive.
In the waitstaff example above, for example, servers might need to engage in nonproductive downtime in the half hour after the daily lunch rush—and eliminating that downtime could result in dissatisfied employees and higher turnover.
2. Use time-tracking software
In today’s technology dominated world, there are a number of time-tracking programs available to help keep your timekeeping accurate. Various solutions that target time theft prevention include biometric time tracking, geofencing (where employees must be within a location-specific boundary to sign in) and GPS-enabled tracking.
While time-tracking applications can be accurate and efficient, they can also appear to be quite obtrusive. It’s important when implementing such software to be aware of any potential infringement of your employees’ privacy.
3. Have a clear time theft policy
Time theft is often unintentional(unconscious) because employees aren’t clear about how they should be spending their work time. When there’s a interruption in customer visits, for example, restaurant waitstaff may not realize they’re supposed to spend the downtime more productively.
You can tackle this by creating a standard policy that clearly states out what constitutes time theft and why engaging in time theft behaviors is detrimental to your business(putting your business at risk). For the example above, a time theft policy could describe tasks that waitstaff are expected to engage in during downtimes when there are no diners in the restaurant.
4. Enforce your time theft policy
5. Be more flexible
Whether it’s offering flexible work arrangements or letting employees know you’re open to requests for unpaid time off, being flexible promotes a culture of trust and accountability—and reduces the chances of employees using paid work time to take care of personal issues.
Conclusion
Time theft can be a serious problem for small business owners or already developed business. But while it’s often hard to detect, there are a number of preventive measures that can go a long way to reducing the potential and opportunity for employees to engage in time theft-enabling behaviors.
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