Pulling tricks like that after three months is asking for the boot, and if he's on a probationary period it's probably quite easy for your boss to get rid.
A year's worth of spend upfront is the kind of thing that could ruin a company, if it's not been budgeted for. Imagine paying a year's electricity bill in advance, based on what someone has assumed you might need...?
pretty fekking dumb really....what was he expecting to happen?
That the employer may not get the money back to you in time to pay it off, thereby you incurring charges and / or interest? That may happen for starters...
You could be mugged, and loose your receipts for meals etc. How do you claim those back?
Lots of things make it a lot riskier than if the company gave you an advance on such things, which most don't
Our old company (that we set up and then sold to a Telco) had no policy as such. Once we'd sold it and were in the 3mth handover period we got this amazingly hilarious gifting policy. Sadly we got a case of really great Central Otago Pinot Noir given to us which the gift-waffe said we had to hand in to be raffled etc etc. What they missed was us swapping the $50 bottles for the $5 bottles in the kitchen (that i suppose technically they owned already as they were company property) - tee hee. Once the smoke cleared we hoovered them all at Friday night drinks 
PC bolax gone wild but yer man who took the TV was on the take IMO.
I can't believe that NOBODY has pointed out the bloody obvious here...
Forget the sodding TV, if ANYBODY working for me (sorry, Logistics is my forte) ordered a year's worth of stuff in one go, particularly if it tied up £5k of my own bloody cashflow, my boot would hit their f**king arse before they knew what to bloody do! As any astute businessman knows, cash is king, and available cash in the bank is the be all and end all. I could potentially understand if this was something like biro's, or sellotape, but a year's worth of either of these doesn't cost £5k unless you're a VERY large business.
Forget the TV (which incidentally is the company's, he was rightly sacked FOR DEFINITE), if you're in purchasing and you fall for the age old tricks of "here, buy a year's worth, we'll chuck a freebie in" then you need to be looking for another job anyway if you ask me! That kind of inefficiency, driven by blatant greed obviously (in the knowledge that he was going to get a TV, and keep it for himself), would not have any place in any company that I had any responsibility for.
This is cut and dry, honestly, no 2 ways about it. Even if he gave the TV back, it's still intent to steal or defraud. Gross Misconduct, not an employment lawyer in the world who would defend his case I'm sure!
Seems one of the chaps in your place grassed him up then?
That's even more worrying.
zokes - are you really suggesting that if you got mugged and lost your expense receipts a company would not have processes in place to reimburse those expenses? 
Maybe if you worked for Mickey Mouse Ltd
The issue is that business expenses are paid for by the business. Any goods or incentive procured as a result of paying for those expenses also belongs to the business.
Grown up businesses that expect their staff to pay for lots of expenses provide advances or company credit cards to minimise the amount their staff have to pay for themselves up front.
imho, in both cases, the TV and the airmiles, they belong to the company who paid for the product/flights and is theirs (the companies) to do with as they see fit.
Any goods or incentive procured as a result of paying for those expenses also belongs to the business.
Not true in the case of air miles. Legally, the miles/points/whatever are awarded to an individual, not to the company. This is in the terms and conditions of the programme. You could be receiving air miles in one of two ways - or both if you are lucky/savvy.
Firstly, the company card you use to pay for business expenses may provide you as the cardholder enrolment in BA miles or any other such scheme. In this case the company is aware when they took on the card programme this is how it works. The miles are funded by the card provider as an inducement to get you to use their product. In turn, the company also benefits as having you use the corporate card means their expense reconciliation process works more efficiently rather than having to process cash receipts. The company may also be accruing some rebate or other benefit on all card spend, so it's not like they lose out.
Secondly, you may have to make payments for business expenses through your own means (or a company card which does not provide reward points) and could enrol directly with the frequent flyer programme off your own back. In this case it is again a contract between the airline and yourself that they will give you a benefit when you fly on their planes, it has nothing to do with who is paying for the ticket.
There are also company level reward programmes such as BA On Business or Star Alliance Company/Corporate Plus. These work in concert with cardholder level programmes rather than in place of. They generally only provide a benefit on miles flown rather than on all spend. Either way, the airline and/or card company makes it quite clear who gets the reward and in what situation.
Sorry for the lengthy reply.
In the case of the guy and the TV however, it's likely that the conditions of the offer would have stipulated the TV belongs to whoever paid for the goods. At the very least he's an idiot for not thinking of the likely consequences of this.
Right to be sacked. I work in purchasing and every freebie I get goes to the company charity raffle. Mind you the best I ever get is a bottle of whisky or wine, never a telly.
The bloke is a dishonest plonker to think he could get away with stealing a telly.
Sam you may be right re airmiles, but HMRC would still consider them to be taxable benefits.
Its company property. A Buyer for Woolworths was once sacked for accepting Wembley tickets from a battery company/supplier. Guess what? There was shedloads of batteries knocking about forever as the Buyer over-ordered to gain the 'favour'.
Such an expensive gift as the TV doesnt come free, its an obvious conflict of interest and your Office Manager obviously didnt have your companies interest in mind. Better off without him. Could you trust this person to procure goods and services at the best possible prices for your business in the future? NO.
"one of our suppliers was offering a 42'' plasma tv at xmas if you bought £5000 worth of gear.
this is a years supply of the stuff we buy from them."
Just reread that line.
So he bought a years supply of stock possibly at an uncompetitive price that has to be stored somewhere for many months to come. Runs home with his ill gotten gains. I wonder if he had gotten away with it what else would he have gotten upto!
I dont care who said 'who grassed him' above (sad) but characters who dont have efficiency/well being of a business deserve to go asap.
A general rant. I hate people who see work as 'us and them'. If a company is paying my wage my loyalty is to them, not elements of 'fellow colleagues' who see ways of skiving, take the p1ss etc as normal and a right. Immature doesnt come close to describing what I feel about them.
TBH these offers like the 'free' TV flippin annoy me. I mean what good is a TV to a business?
But more to the point, forget the TV's just give me a good service, and if you have money for 'free'TV's then just lower the price even if it's only short term.
You've got to at least have an agreement with those above you about the allocation of airmiles, just buying £5k of supplies for your own benefit is a foolish mistake that was always going to bite him in the ass.
As for sacking the guy, you think they should have offered him a healthy redundancy package - not really feasible was it.
He also may have been given the option to do something in the meeting, refused and then been sacked - who knows what went on behind the closed doors.
the guy was dumb, plain and simple. If he wasn't smart enough to clarify the position, there's no way I would even employ him as an office manager.
3 months into the job too. clearly not the sharpest tool...
At my company we received a Nintendo Wii free with an order. As most people already had one I asked everyone (about 15 people)if I could take it for a very substantial donation to the tea/coffee club. Everyone now has free coffee and biscuits for 4-5 months and I've gave the Nintendo Wii to my son for his birthday. Everyone happy!
TBH these offers like the 'free' TV flippin annoy me. I mean what good is a TV to a business?
The company Ton works for are in the TV aerial/satellite wholesale business so a TV could reasonably be expected to be sold on to their existing customers.
It's the same in the fixings market
Hilti will give you a very nice drill indeed if you buy enough fixings - it's just the way that sort of wholesaling works
The TV was the company's to sell on - not a freebie [totally unrelated] gift.
sacked for stupidity.
no leniency required, thats why our economy is fcuked - we already employ too many morons.
discuss.
coolhandluke - MemberSeems one of the chaps in your place grassed him up then?
That's even more worrying.
How so? I'd grass him up in a second, and I'd run around telling everyone I did too! As Hora says, less of the "them and us" attitude, if a company pays your wages your loyalty is to them. It's guys like this guy stealing the TV that means everyone else is less likely to get a bonus etc. come wag review time, so he's not just stealing a TV but stealing money out of everyone else's pockets by being greedy and inefficient.
In my last job, trying to get everyone to conciously recycle all the plastics and the cardboard in the warehouse was a nightmare. Everyone assumed that it was a management decision to "make their lives worse". Of course, when you try explaining to people that by recycling we were going to be paying a lot less to the refuse collection company as we were charged per skip empty, and that people would pay for cardboard and plastic if we collected enough of it and sorted it properly, they were still a bit flummoxed. Only when they actually saw it working were they even in the slightest won round.
People's natural reaction is sadly very anti change, and anti management.
What the guy at Ton's company should have done was made his boss aware that if he bought £5k's worth of stuff, he could get a free TV for the company to do what it wishes with, and to let his boss then decide. Being astute and letting your boss know all the facts often has a much better end result than stealing stuff on the side. Unless your boss is a total c*nt of course!
But what about the collateral damage? Ton had a days holiday booked to come and ride with us round Ambleside today. He had to go into work, and we had to enjoy a great day in the snow without him.
That sales manager has no thoughts for anyone but himself!!!
P.S. Ton, when I buy tyres off you in future will you make sure that I put the ****** things on
frank, problem with the tyres, please tell me.
did you have a good day.
i was gutted but could not get away.
the guy was found out because the supplier [unifix] billed our company for £5000.
it rang alarm bells at head office who contacted the supplier to ask about the invoice.
a copy invoice was sent to them , it showed the tv at zero cost.
no one grassed him.
Ton, the only problem with the tyres is that I was too lazy to fit them. A good day. Deejay will send you some piccies. Rydal Water was waist deep. That was fun after a couple had been through and muddied everything so we couldn't see the rocks!
Sam you may be right re airmiles, but HMRC would still consider them to be taxable benefits.
It's a bit of a grey area really. The latest indication from HMRC is that as long as the individual pays the programme enrolment fee (there usually is one) then there is no fringe benefits tax liability. In practice this fee is billed to the card and settled by the company as a business expense. To date, the HMRC have not investigated/assessed anyone for benefits received through air miles. The complication is that your one air miles account can earn points through miles flown and pounds spent both as an individual and as an employee. So far it seems the HMRC haven't got the appetite to go digging through it all as the sums involved are generally very small. Also, how would they value a point/air mile? Their nominal value as declared by the creator of the loyalty currency is very small (usually 0.01p per point). So do you value it at what they 'could' be exchanged for? if so, then what? Most schemes offer a wide range of redemption possibilities which also have a wide range of value per point - which would they choose? Do they take the cost price to the provider or the market value of what's redeemed? Anyhow, it's a pretty complex area, which is I guess why they don't go into it...
Sorry for the ramble, it's one of few things I actually know a little about...
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