How to handle theft within business

[Apothecary]

Hi,

I've recently come to learn that two of my senior Thai staff have set-up their own business in direct competition with my business (professional service company of 25 staff). This was established by them about 1.5 years ago. Between them they own 99% of the company shareholding and a third person (also my staff) holds 1%. Two of my other staff are signed as witnesses in their company document.

I have strong indication they have taken at least one long-term customer directly from us and there is high chance they have directly or indirectly taken other business (that we may have been quoting on / developing) as well as potential staff we had tried to hire.

Sacking all these people would create havoc to our ongoing operation (and possible severance pay if the labor court gets their way.. even i realize the circumstances for dismissal are likely in our favor).

Disciplining these people is an option but i have no experience of something like this and what kind of penalty to apply or even the likely response. Also even how to approach this - Thai's can't stand to lose face.

Taking them to court for theft/misconduct would be costly and may not achieve much other than to show the people i have no tolerance for this.

I'd be most grateful if anyone could give any advise or suggestions in this situation in terms of a workable remedy/way out with minimal damages?

Thanks in advance.

Edited March 16, 2015 by Apothecary

[Asiantravel]

I feel very sorry for you and your situation.

A similar thing happened to me many years ago but not in Thailand.

I can understand you want to avoid the legal route but on the other hand you have to show strength.

One way I tried to display strength in my case was to hire one of the best Queen's Counsel barristers to immediately serve an injunction on them to prevent them from using any of the information or names that had taken from my company. Yes it was expensive to hire this person but it showed I certainly meant business and I calculated they wouldn't want to do the same thing or couldn't afford to hire somebody of that calibre.

It mostly worked in the end in that the injunction prevented them from contacting clients that were clearly stolen from my company

Edited March 16, 2015 by Asiantravel

[ezzra]

This a quite common occurrence in this country where scruples mean nothing... every business

is at risk of theft, be it money, ideas, staff and stock, this is one of the major drawbacks to owning

a business in Thailand where you have almost no recourse to sue for business identity, customers

and product's ideas and rights,

You will be up struggling to sue them for any grounds that you have mentioned, unless they have signed

a non disclosure agreement which I trust they didn't, the law in this country regarding these issue

is a joke and useless at best, you'd be paying some lawyer lots of monies in fees for nothing, unless

you can get them to agree on a pay for results scheme, which again, I doubt it,

what to do? talk to a lawyer, and if you see that this is a hopeless case, just let it go

and your best to do better, much better than those thieves to regain your confidant and

your lost customers back.....

Edited March 16, 2015 by ezzra

[MobileContent]

You can't really do anything.

I had the same problem many years back and a friend of mine just had the same problem a few months ago.

The best, just move on and learn from it.

Forget lawyers. If you really want to go after them hire a hixmex

[pkspeaker]

'Professional service staff'.. Ok so your an escort service right? Or what exactly is the business type, its hard to advise when we have no clue.. btw i was joking (maybe..unless im right)

What is the professional service?

But anyways just firethem and be done with it, you cant keep them around, first step fire them now and if they take legal action then you have to deal with that then, they probably wont because you might countersue.

Edited March 16, 2015 by pkspeaker

[gemguy]

I would hire a private detective to build up a case against them and gather as much damaging evidence as possible and find out exactly how they are profiting from you.

Not a Thai private detective if possible

Maybe you could learn some way to legally sabotage their business in a variety of ways without them knowing it is you behind the scenes

Meantime make like you know nothing and let them carry on building a case against themselves.

Be prepared to go the legal route and prepared to go head to head with them while the back door option is always open...if you know what I mean....because they will not play fair and be honest when you finally do confront them....if you do.

Consult lots and lots of lawyers and people who would be considered excellent council in such matters and be in no hurry to move on them too fast.

Another thing is, be unaccountable to them as they are to you and be vague about your relationship with them and do not let them in on any more business meetings or give them any customer contacts or let then deal with the customers......and do not be so friendly and helpful as before.

Meantime you should slowly reduce their wages and benefits to compensate yourself from the loss of money they are causing you.

And always smile and make like nothing is going on.....as in.......do it Thai style

Cheers

[mamypoko]

If choking them with legal fees is not an option, bulk up your sales staff.

Good luck and make lemonade

[ggt]

My God man...what is your problem? Hire yourself some more employees and get rid of these folks before your business is totally in ruins...this is a no brainer...grow some balls...tackle the task head-on...no remorse...send them packing today...

[maidee]

so people who own stock & witnesses, still work in your business

you don't think they are NOT stealing your database / customers ????

[RT555]

1) Fire them.......Inform them that a lawyer has been contacted.

2) Change the locks.

3) Get into their computers, and lock them down.

4) Have a nice lunch.

5) Make an internet sweep of past history of fired employees and make it repetitious of current staff browsing.

[2fishin2]

This should be a no brainer....fire any of your staff working with this other business. What kind of business are you in that these people can work full time for you and have another? I wouldnt give a second thought to these people at all. In fact, I would show them the door on their way out.

[1sickpuppy]

You can't really do anything.

I had the same problem many years back and a friend of mine just had the same problem a few months ago.

The best, just move on and learn from it.

Forget lawyers. If you really want to go after them hire a hixmex

Seriously if you have more than half a brain, why would you push shit uphill ? if you have the $ rent, dont do buisiness they will find a way to screw you out of it, enough said. is great country great people, but do not do buisiness, you have a better chance of winning in Iraque

[Daniel Ingalls]

.....Repeat after me, and say it three times,....your fired.......your fired........your fired......now go tell the guilty ones!

[Soutpeel]

seems to me you have grounds for immediate dismissal for your two senior staff who have set the other business up, based on gross misconduct and as such severance would not be payable, and all per the labor act

[NickJ]

What most people dont understand is that what they have done might not even be against the law here. There are to many varibles. I do know that wrongful ternination can be expensive here as the labor dept has teeth. I would talk with a lawyer that is very well removed from your company.....You may need to slowly start moving all your assets into a new shadow company.

[PeCeDe]

I lived in small town Ontario when someone did this to me, I hired every lawyer in town (3) to represent me, and then none of them could work for the other guy because of conflict laws. But unfortunately you sound like you can't do that. It's a real shame when people steal your business from under you like that, but it's a common thing, and brooding over it will hurt you more than them. My best advice is let it go, and wait for them to "shoot themselves in the foot." At that point you'll get back what they took. Easy to say huh? but it's experience.

Edited March 16, 2015 by PeCeDe

[snottgoblin]

OP should fire them if he the evidence, then issue them with a claim. Should have NDNCA in place, maybe even something in a contrat. People who do this sort of stunt ultimately fail, because they think they can do as they please.

Wish the op well

[CapeThai]

Like another member mentioned it's hard to advise if we don't know what type of service business your running...

Anyway If you think logical about everything and want this all to come to a positive end for youself and the sake to carry on with business as usual and minimize damages of getting rid of these bastards is to let them dig a hole for themselves and bury themselves and their business in it simultaneously.

Create a bullshit business deal which will cost, but also make big time money so they can outrun you and loose all their funding. This should also be a setup with proof being kept which can be provided should they turn nasty on you after you sack the lot.

Cripple their business finances.... Hit them where it hurts the most.... Business is business and you must do what what you need to do to survive in this jungle called business.

[CapeThai]

Somehow this seems like a trolling post.... What business man let this shit go on within his company ? Because the so called guilty ones is senior Thai staff does not make the underwater golfers.... Screw them and grow some balls if your not busy trolling.

Neither do I see the OP returning any comments to some questions asked by some members....

Edited March 16, 2015 by CapeThai

[Pheat123]

Can you advise what do you mean by a personal service business

Are you running escort sites?

[timendres]

By continuing to employ these dirtbags, you are enabling them to further their enterprise.

Fire them immediately to put the pressure on them financially. This is your best leverage.

If you are concerned about being liable for severance, then you need to get them to quit.

One way to do that is to have your company require all employees to sign a new confidentiality agreement that they will find unacceptable.

[Apothecary]

Dear everyone,

I firstly want to thank each of you for your response.

Some of them were particularly resonant and sympathetic. Particularly 'Asiantravel', 'ezzra', 'MobileContent' and 'PeCeDe' and less so 'CapeThai'.

Although under normal circumstances firing would be the obvious choice, due to the fact these people are senior, they could potentially do more damage after firing than keeping them on our books. Replacing them is not that simple due to hiring and training new staff takes 3-6 months.

I am looking at this strategically and for one of the main culprits I plan to make very busy and have them working with our well known out of town a lot. For another I'm looking to assign a foreign staff to work closely with him which would make it harder.

My feeling is that this 'other' business the Thai staff have established lacks leadership and would be hard for them to run when the people are not there actively.

I'm going to wait until I can obtain their 2014 financial report (in the next month or two) and then get a better picture of realistic damage before I start throwing arrows. I realise some business can be cash in hand but almost all of the companies we're involved with have proper accounting procedures so would not deal in cash.

The other thing I will be doing is having all our staff sign a new agreement to cover non-circumvention, non-disclosure (NCND), non-solicitation and theft and adding to our company policy.

Legal route is my last and least preferred option.


Thanks again. A virtual beer to you all!

Edited March 19, 2015 by Apothecary

[2fishin2]

You are pushover for letting them stay around. They are cancer in your organization. If you want to live with it go right ahead.

[onthemoon]

Please do tell us what business you are in. Apparently you are supplying a platform for them to get new customers but they can do the operations on the side - wouldn't work in my industry.

Personally, I believe no-one is irreplaceable and if an employee opens his own competing company and steals customers, he's gone. No further discussions, even if the Labour Department makes me pay a fine due to the Thai laws. It's just not acceptable behaviour for an employee.

But since you have many of your employees doing this, please do ask yourself why there is no loyalty to your company and to you. I have a feeling you are not telling us everything. You don't need to, on this public forum, but this is a question that comes to mind.