{"id":745,"date":"2016-03-17T10:54:04","date_gmt":"2016-03-17T08:54:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/?p=745"},"modified":"2016-03-31T10:13:57","modified_gmt":"2016-03-31T08:13:57","slug":"what-is-team-misconduct","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/2016\/03\/17\/what-is-team-misconduct\/","title":{"rendered":"WHAT IS &#8220;TEAM MISCONDUCT&#8221;?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/dismissal.png\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-746\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-746\" src=\"http:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/dismissal.png\" alt=\"dismissal\" width=\"195\" height=\"131\" \/><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>EMPLOYERS: IS \u201cTEAM MISCONDUCT\u201d GROUNDS FOR DISMISSAL?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s an unhappy scenario for any employer \u2013<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u00a0You are losing a fortune in stock shrinkage,<\/li>\n<li>\u00a0You can prove that the losses stem from theft by a particular group of employees,<\/li>\n<li>But you cannot prove that each member of the group is individually responsible.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>What can you do? A recent Labour Court case illustrates.<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Fast food filching \u2013 a team effort<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A fast food outlet was suffering large (up to R120,000 per month) stock losses, always when one particular shift, comprising cooks, \u201cexpediters\u201d and cashiers, was on duty.<\/p>\n<p>2.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Security and stock handling measures failed to stem the losses.<\/p>\n<p>3.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Several warnings were issued to staff. \u00a0They were told that they had a duty to report theft, that the stock shrinkage was \u201cintolerable\u201d, that there was a \u201czero tolerance\u201d policy to theft and that disciplinary action would be taken if the losses continued. \u00a0These warnings bore no fruit.<\/p>\n<p>4.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Disciplinary enquiries were held and the whole team &#8211; all 11 members of the shift &#8211; was dismissed for theft.<\/p>\n<p>5.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The thefts stopped immediately.<\/p>\n<p>6.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The dismissed employees took the matter to the CCMA where an arbitrator, finding the dismissals to have been unfair, awarded 6 months\u2019 compensation to each of them.<\/p>\n<p>7.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 On review, the Labour Court set aside this ruling and held the dismissals to have been substantively fair.<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>The law and collective liability<\/em><\/strong> This was, held the Court, a case of \u201cteam misconduct\u201d, and accordingly \u201cthere is no need to prove individual guilt. It is sufficient that the employee is a member of the team, a team the members of which have individually failed to ensure that the team meets its obligations, in our given case, to ensure that there is no stock loss.\u201d Note that similar principles apply to cases of \u201ccollective misconduct\u201d, \u201cderivative misconduct\u201d and \u201ccommon cause purpose\u201d \u2013 but as always, our labour laws being as complex as they are, and with substantial penalties awaiting the unwary employer, it is always worth taking full advice on your particular circumstances.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">Source: LawDotNews &#8211; April 2015<\/p>\n<p><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>EMPLOYERS: IS \u201cTEAM MISCONDUCT\u201d GROUNDS FOR DISMISSAL? Here\u2019s an unhappy scenario for any employer \u2013 \u00a0You are losing a fortune in stock shrinkage, \u00a0You can prove that the losses stem from theft by a particular group of employees, But you<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[22],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=745"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":748,"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745\/revisions\/748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anthonywhatmore.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}