Wondering please, if I can pick someone's brain on behalf of my brother.

He is a civilian working for the Police as a Crime Analyst. He and about 30 others were informed by the Internal Standards Dept that they were being investigated on grounds of Gross Misconduct for misuse of the internet. He was informed of the investigation and accusation in August 2007. It is now December 2007 and the investigation is still on going, and there appears to be no end date in sight. The misuse was considered as the amount of time spent 'surfing' the internet and was calculated by an external program that logs every web page or pop address visited. The system calculates the amount of time on each page per minute, it rounds up to the nearest minute, e.g 1sec = 1minute. They consider any website with 'police' in the address to be acceptable usage (even if it is looking at the internal job boards!). There is apparently a policy in place for internet usage that was written about 5 years ago, he was not made aware of this policy until the investigation began. There have been various meetings concerning the data during which there has been information provided by my brother to account for his usage of certain sites as part of his job which has not been taken into account or corrected on the data. His manager has attested and attended these meetings and confirmed the usage is work related. My brother has never been given a contract of employment, the HR department state they do not have a signed copy on his file. The investigation is impacting on his work performance and he has received complaints of this nature from his direct manager. He is now getting very frustrated and begining to feel victimised. What can he do.....as yet the HR department have not got involved, there is no mention of disciplinary action. He has been employed by the police for 4 years and to date he has an exemplorary record with them, he received an excellent performance review in the months prior to this investigation commencing. The other employees being investigated included IT staff who queried the data being used and the accuracy, as a result an independent company was enlisted to test the data and the system that compiled it. Their results were that the data was not 100% correct and that there were errors in it. The IT staff in question walked out in protest of the Internal Standards not stopping the investigation based on this information. Other staff members have been suspended and then required to return to work pending the outcome of the investigation.

I am an HR professional myself and in my experience, if you suspect someone of gross misconduct they should be suspended on full pay immediately you have the suspicion. An investigation should then be carried out with them out of the environment and that this investigation should be completed within a timely manner..... not spanning months! I have suggested that as the data has been proven to be incorrect by an external source, and that his and his managers explanations of internet usage have been disregarded that the investigation is not being carried out fairly and as such any action that follows can also be considered as unfair.

Can anyone please give him/me some advice on his standing and what to do next?

thanks

I certainly agree that such procedures should be carried out in timely fashion and within a reasonable timescale.  It would appear that their own investigation has unearthed discrepencies and they must be aware that they will be challenged should they proceed under these circumstances.

My advice would be to write to the HR dept demanding an explanation of the progress of this case and stating that due to the prolonged process, your brother is suffering undue anxiety and stress, which is affecting both his home and work life, resulting in reduced productivity regarding his job.

He should also emphasise that he disagrees with the data provided and put in writing that he was unaware of the policy regarding computer use.  In addition, he would be advised to point out that as he has not received a contract of employment, it is highly probable that he will be unaware of many of the company's policies and procedures.  I would also hint that he has taken advice on this matter.

Hope this helps.

Hi Jan,

Thanks for your advice, thankfully they have now dropped the investigation! I have advised him to get it in writing and that all documentation relating to the investigation has not been kept on his personel file.

thanks again

Regards Sarah