Crime In The Workplace - Essay Example

Question: Discuss the assertion that staff dishonesty represents every bit as great a threat to the retail sector as customer theft, yet retailers are less prepared to acknowledge and confront the problem.Answer:IntroductionThe assertion that staff dishonesty is every bit as great a threat to the retail sector as customer theft is true and the assertion that retailers are less prepared to acknowledge and confront the problem does not bear overall merit at all. This essay outlines the facts supporting the contention of the author the threat of employee dishonesty to retail sector.

It also discusses the response or behaviour of retailers towards this threat. Information from various sources is used to provide relevant background or support to the presentation and discussion of contentions in this essay. Employee Dishonesty Recognized as a Great Threat to the Retail SectorJack Hayes International reported that incidence of employee dishonesty or employee theft increased to almost 7% in year 2006 compared to incidence of apprehension in year 2005 (19th Annual Retail Theft Survey 2007).

A total of 66,507 total numbers of apprehensions was reported by survey participants that were composed of 23 large retail companies in the United States that are managing 14,118 retail stores across the country. The amount recovered from these apprehensions totalled to $56.6 M which is 16% higher compared to the amount recovered in year 2005. The survey further reported that there is an increase in the average value of goods stolen by employees that amounts to $851, an increase of 9% from year 2005.

The study dispels the notion that employees steal only products with lower values such as office supplies from their retail employers. A study conducted by the University of Florida in 2002 reported higher amount of recorded employee theft in the retail sector in the United States that reached $15 billion based on the assessment of retail managers on the distribution of their annual losses wherein 48% comes from employee theft (Vargas 2002). On the other hand, Commerical Investigations New Zealand, a private investigation company, reported that 40% of losses in the retail sector in New Zealand are due to employee theft.

In the United Kingdom, the British Retail Consortium (BRC) established the Retail Crime Initiative program as early as 1990s to address the growing concern on theft occurrences in the retail sector. BRC reported a total of 31,000 cases of customer theft which amounted to damages of 386 million pounds in a survey conducted covering years 1995 to 1996 among 48,000 retail outlets in the United Kingdom (Beck, A. & Willis, A). In the same survey, BRC reported that staff theft comprised 37% of total losses of the fashion sector with an absolute amount of 47 million pounds which is slightly lower by 4% from losses incurred due to customer theft.

Parallel incident was experienced by retailer sin Scotland wherein the Scottish Retail Consortium reported from its Third Survey of Retail Crime in 2005 that there is an upward trend in the incidence of staff theft in the retail sector. In Australia, Kevin Philip (1995) in his paper on Theft and Fraud in Supermarkets stated this quote pertaining to the outlook of retailers in the supermarket industry: “everybody is willing to concede that staff dishonesty was a problem” (page 1).