What to do about unethical former employer
What to do about unethical former employer
(OP)
I entered full time employment in May 2006(still finishing BS Civil/Env. w/ two distance learning courses). I went to work for a land surveyor that owns an engineering firm, and came to find out that he was making other employees fill out new time sheets with hours charged to projects that weren't being worked on, and then shred the old, correct time sheet.
I have since moved from the area and have found work at a ready-mix plant w/ the main duty of being project manager for constructing a new ready-mix plant.
My question is if there is anything I can do about my former employer; he sits on the board for the Pro. land surveyors, and the evidence of his actions is routinely destroyed. I know he has done this for a long time, since while I was looking for other employment I spoke with someone who had worked for this same person about a decade earlier and witnessed the same thing.
I think something should be done, but I don't have evidence to prove his actions.
I have since moved from the area and have found work at a ready-mix plant w/ the main duty of being project manager for constructing a new ready-mix plant.
My question is if there is anything I can do about my former employer; he sits on the board for the Pro. land surveyors, and the evidence of his actions is routinely destroyed. I know he has done this for a long time, since while I was looking for other employment I spoke with someone who had worked for this same person about a decade earlier and witnessed the same thing.
I think something should be done, but I don't have evidence to prove his actions.





RE: What to do about unethical former employer
In the first instance, I think it's vindictive to report him without confronting him first. Secondly, I don't think that it's worth jepordizing your career over since you (a) don't have any evidence and (b) don't know for certain that clients were being billed directly off the timesheets.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
I agree with Francesca that you should let this go, for your own sake. But I absolutely think that messaging timesheets is a despicable practice. For one, in the public sector timesheets are often subject to audit by the various agencies, particularly for cost plus types of projects. Another problem is that this is very demoralizing for the project manager whose project is getting the bogus charges. Luckily I have never had this done to my projects. Good thing because I would not put up with this, would make a lot of noise and probably get myself fired.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Discuss this with the owner? Why? That's like going to the "Hole in the Wall" and asking Sundance to return the money to the Union Pacific Railroad. I see nothing coming from that strategy. There is no requirement for Grubbyky to confront the purp and discuss this with him, and possibly create a "situation" in the process. If public funds are involved and you know that this practice occured, you have a public duty to report it directly to the officials responsible for those funds. And actually, If you don't, you could be considered an accomplice too.
Evidence? In this situation Grubbyky has no responsibility to be presenting anyone with evidence. That is the job of the investigation board or the police. If he knows this is going on, he must report it with or without evidence.
As long as you don't go over the project budget? What has budget got to do with a correct and proper bill? What do you do on a cost+ project? What's the limitation there? I sincerely hope "COE" isn't short for Corps of Engineers.
My clients see and sign my timesheet.
Grubbyky, if you do have a sense of moral responsibility towards something you know is definately wrong and are outraged sufficiently to the point where you feel you must do something, (not in a spirit of revenge), you should file a complaint, perhaps with the registration board, or with the public officials in your area that are responsible for looking into those matters. If they throw your complaint away, you still know YOU did the right thing.
So what's the deal? Did you guys work for Enron or something?
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
You have (Petroleum) next to your name, so I'm assuming you're not a civil engineer. In my experience working in civil/surveying companies, timesheets are for internal accounting purposes only. I have never worked somewhere where exact timesheet hours are billed to a client. It's not the same thing as a direct contract worker relationship.
Yes, lieing on a timesheet is wrong, but if nobody is injured in the process, where is the harm? Timesheets have nothing to do with a company's profit and loss, either. Profit and loss accounting uses payroll, not employee productive hours. Your comparison to Enron is a bit of a stretch, though I appreciate it was made in jest.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
No & Yes
No=In my previous life I was a Texas Reg PE in Structural and worked for 2 large "civil" companies in Houston, Turner, Collie & Braden, and Lockwood, Andrews & Newnam. I didn't see it going on there.
Yes= For the last 20+ years I traded in "TCB" for things like "BTC", Baku, Tbilisi-Ceyhan. I appreciate a good sense of humor.
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
I also wonder how it would be handled if you were brought in to litigation and folks looked at the time sheet records wherein it was determined that you altered these records. I'd say, there'd be some tall explaining to do.
I've always (well since 1977) documented my actual time on projects give or take a few for the coffee pot, or other daily interruptions (like this forum - ha).
f-d
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Fattdad, I didn't mean to imply things are entirely black or white either. Relax, "reasonable and customary" labor expense includes "coffee break", "afternoon "tea", a 4:15 asprin, and one maybe two short phone calls to the "significant other" and all clients expect to have those "reasonable" items included in their bill. I'd even include these forums, under a thread title related to the work you are doing, but not all, whereas personal e-mails, etc. etc., well that's another story, isn't it?
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
If you take the time to look at why the particular jobs are loosing money, you will be better off in the end. It is called learning from your mistakes. If you want to know how you are doing overall, then run a summary report for the year.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
It was stated that they are used for internal accounting only (true on lump sum jobs), but those revisions can distort that same internal accounting. Internal record keeping can be important in future bidding and assessing work performance among other things.
As far as hourly employees, their performance assessment relevent to billable hours should not hinge on whether a project has gone over budget. Cost control is the PMs job.
In the above cases, if the company wants to massage time sheets, it's really their loss.
For time and materials jobs, like work we do on government contracts which bill hourly time straight off the timesheet; massaging a timesheet could be considered theft.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Just as an added bonus, in many places, if you report fraud against a public entity and a sucessful case is prosecuted, you may be entitled to collect a sizable percentage of the penalties assessed as well.
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
If you work half a day and that includes a couple of cups of coffee and a call from the wife I don't have a problem with that. If you work half a day for me and half a day for the other project and I pick up the bill for both - That's fraud.
Grubbyky You will find fights you can win and fights you can't. Very few of the ones you can't are worth fighting. This is one of those you should walk away from. Learn from it and resolve to deal fairly with those who trust you with their buisness.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
I think that's the correct resolution: Pick your battles. Take the high road. If it doesn't pass the stink test than it's not right and you should move on. Now that you are in a better place, I'd just chalk it up to life's lessons and move on. Hopefully you can learn from your new colleagues and they agree with your perspective on business matters such as these.
f-d
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Just because a project has a limit doesn't mean that it has to be met. Some projects finish below budgets and others over. When the budgets are over and there is a good reason like scope was increased, the client and firm should agree on a new ceiling. If not, oh well. Fudging time sheets isn't going to win the day since "it's only legal if you get caught" then someday you'll get caught and what a big fine that will be....even losing your license to do business. Most certainly your credibility as a company....what client wants to work with a suspect company....next thing you know, we didn't really need that stability check anyway....I can save some time there and bill that out as having checked it. Nutty.
Regards,

Qshake
Eng-Tips Forums:Real Solutions for Real Problems Really Quick.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
This used to cause a problem in the billing of the clients. Most if not all staff worked unpaid overtime. Which the company would not charge to the project. They took the view that as we are not paying the staff the time shouldnt be recorded against the budget (shortsighted as then at the end of the job you dont really know how many hours it took so will underestimate the next project. Not a problem as the staff still work for free).
To get round this there was a dump code which went nowhere except to prove the exact number of hours an individual worked.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
The unpaid overtime code came to comply with the law, so the company knew how many hours staff were actually working. They would check the hours and if anyone was working too much they were told to reduce their hours.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Now whether or not the employee gets paid for all of those hours depends on if the employee is exempt or non-expempt and the terms of their employeement. Along the same line of thought, whether the client gets bill for all of those hours depends on the terms of the contract between the client and the company.
With respect to some of the other comments that have been made;
1. If you don't record all of the time you work on a project, then the company has no idea if that project is making the company money or not. Obviously a very important piece of information for any company.
2. No client should EVER be billed for work that was performed on a different project. That is theft by any other name.
With respect to the original post, unless the company works for the federal government, I would drop it and be glad to be working somewhere else. However, if federal contracts, and possibly state depending ont the state, were involved, I would call the agency and "drop a dime" on the employeer. Not to be vendictive, but to ensure that a. they no longer get federal contracts and b. that the tax payer's are not paying more and getting less.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Unpaid overtime (even to exempt classified employees) is not permissible, if the unpaid overtime can be considered a regular practice of the company.
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
I'm not sure whether this is illegal or not, maybe someone with a better legal background than me can chime in.
Everywhere I have worked senior staff do not get paid overtime while junior staff do. I have no idea why this is the case. They just get paid their salary every month regardless of the hours worked. But nearly all the senior staff I know work more than the basic 37.5 hours on which the salary is based. Is this illegal, I dont see why if they want to give their time to company free of charge.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Legality of the practice I think involves "fair compensation", which can take many forms, end-of-year bonuses, profit sharing, equal time off, assisted share purchases, vestment in pension plans, etc. I would assume the general rule is that senior types would be entitled to a larger share of those benefits, whatever form they come in, and hence the fair practice would be maintained with increased years of service.
Why would someone want to work for a profit making organization "free of charge"? Where's the fairness in that? That is not to say I don't work for free, but I reserve that time for those who [color]cannot[/color] pay and desperately need help. I volunteer for non-profit making organizations and spend some of my time designing and installing small village water supply and irrigation systems in South America and Africa. This system was installed this year.
I learned how to design a 200 VDC solar power system for the pump... not easy. (it was an existing 200 VDC motor)
http://www.faces-gambia.org/website.htm
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
I will quite happily work unpaid overtime if it means I can get a batch of drawings or a tender out the door on Friday. OK, this benefits the company more than me, and I maybe should have a more mercenary attitude when it comes to my time. But we digress from the original topic.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Common practice varies widely from country to country and culture to culture, and company to company, some more sensitive and flexible than others, some more demanding. One company I worked for absolutely prohibited any unpaid hours because they refused to sell their only product for free, and had a tendency to burn out their employees and force them to look for other work. Another didn't mind, as long as the client was charged for the hours and compensation time was liberally granted in return. What's the norm in the US and England is pretty far from for example the Mideast, or for that matter, Sweden or France.
Despite what the common practice may be in your area, usually interesting variations can be found in the local laws, both as written and as interpreted by the labor boards.
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
I find it hard to believe there are not engineers in the US who work that little bit extra for which they are not paid just to get the job done before the weekend, or to put in a little more time to come up with a better design which gives a little satisfaction.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Engineers are stupid that way.
By which I mean, a fair number of shops here have had the unmitigated gall to formalize the practice, and _demand_ unpaid overtime, as in "We'll pay you for 40 hrs/wk, and expect you to work at least 50."
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
When my classmates and I were first on the job market, the impression I got was that in the private sector in my field I could expect to work 50-60 hours per week, or worse.
Hg
Eng-Tips policies: FAQ731-376
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
P.S. Call from home.
BigInch
-born in the trenches.
http://virtualpipeline.spaces.msn.com
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
Regarding overtime: If it's billable we're paid; if it's not it's considered part of the job. A previous employer used to keep track of the unpaid hours and compensate us somewhat in the annual increase, and there were bonus payments in our 401k as well, but after we were sold those practices were lost. Now, only the officers of the company receive bonuses.
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
I've always believed that my salary reflects the job that I do and not the hours I work. This is in contrast to the actual wording in my contract but never mind...
I have been asked, on occasion, to book time to tasks that I wasn't working on and did so knowing that the "fraud" was internal within the company. I also work on jobs which are timecharged and would hope I have the integrity to not behave fraudulently in those cases.
My experience of timecharge work is that clients only permit this work for small sums and generally there is a cap not to be exceeded. As the cap is set at the top estimate for the job, the client rarely ends up paying more than would be the case with a lump sum fee...
RE: What to do about unethical former employer
I have worked in both the public and private sectors. People are expected to work unpaid overtime in the private sector, whilst in the public sector you work no more than 37 hours a week, as any excess is given back to you via. flexible working arrangements.
VB