• Home
  • About Us
    • Our Team
    • Our Mission
    • Testimonials
    • Service Areas
  • Services
    • Tax Services
    • Audit & Assurance
    • Accounting
    • Litigation Support
    • Valuation Advisory
    • Forensic Accounting
    • Business Consulting
  • Resources
    • Client Center
    • Online Tools
    • Important Sites
    • Timely Opportunities
  • MBA News
  • Careers
    • Senior Tax Accountant
    • Tax Manager
    • Bookkeeper / Accountant
  • Contact Us
  • Facebook
  • Google+
  • Linkedin
  • Savvy
  • Twitter
  • Home
  • About Us
    • Our Team
    • Our Mission
    • Testimonials
    • Service Areas
  • Services
    • Tax Services
    • Audit & Assurance
    • Accounting
    • Litigation Support
    • Valuation Advisory
    • Forensic Accounting
    • Business Consulting
  • Resources
    • Client Center
    • Online Tools
    • Important Sites
    • Timely Opportunities
  • MBA News
  • Careers
    • Senior Tax Accountant
    • Tax Manager
    • Bookkeeper / Accountant
  • Contact Us

Blog Post

Monitoring Employees: What’s Allowed? What Makes Sense?

11 Dec 2014
Comment are off
MBA Site Administrator

Once upon a time, monitoring employees consisted primarily of sprinkling around a few video cameras in the warehouse to detect inventory pilfering. Times have changed: Today you can harness “behavioral modeling” software to try to assess employee productivity, using multiple data inputs combing activity on their computers (including web browsing activities), GPS data and other information. One monitoring service vendor boasts that you can “know what your employees are doing every second of the year.”

An organization called the “Privacy Rights Clearinghouse” maintains a laundry list of ways employers can monitor employees. The list is intended to help employees know their rights, but as the information makes clear, their privacy rights are limited. Consider:

Monitoring Basics

  • Telephone monitoring. Under just about any scenario, you can monitor employees’ telephone calls, either by recording them or tuning in. Some states, such as California, require that you give them a heads-up if you are recording calls. Most don’t. However, if you’re monitoring calls and you happen to listen in on a conversation that clearly is personal in nature, you are obliged to hang up. Yet if your company has a “no personal calls on company phones” policy described in your employee handbook, you can make note of a violation of that policy.
  • Telephone records. You can review logs of individual employees’ calls by the phone number dialed and the call duration.
  • Conversations among employees. Generally these can be monitored on the same basis as business-related telephone conversations.
  • Computer keystrokes and terminal monitors. Software is readily available that allows you to do this, and in general it’s legal — unless you have a formal agreement with employees not to do so, of course. The same applies to monitoring the amount of time employees spend active at the computer.
  • Email. The email from and to employees who are using company-owned computers is not private. That includes Gmail, Yahoo or other such personal web-based email accounts accessed via a company computer. Employers also can review deleted email.
  • Text messages. You generally can access texts to and from employees on company-owned smartphones. Similarly, you can also monitor the audio of calls placed on company-owned mobile phones.
  • Snail mail. Mail addressed to an employee at the workplace generally can be opened by the employer. However, this area is somewhat murky; consult an attorney before proceeding.
  • Video monitoring. As noted earlier, this has long been a common practice. Common sense exceptions must be made for places like locker rooms and bathrooms, however.
  • Tracking employees via GPS systems. This generally is allowed if their movements are based on the requirements of their job, such as making deliveries, taking checks to the bank, and so on. However, it’s best to inform employees that this is your practice.

Obtain Legal Guidance

It’s a good idea to get a labor attorney to guide you with respect to monitoring policies that may seem particularly intrusive. In general, spelling out your monitoring policies in your employee handbook is a good idea so that employees have been given fair warning. In some cases it might also be wise to get their written acknowledgement of their understanding of that policy.

Beyond simply protecting yourself legally, weigh the pros and cons of each element of your employee monitoring policy. Consider:

  1. What are the risks you are trying to reduce?
  2. How serious are those risks?
  3. How effective will the monitoring method be in reducing those risks?
  4. How will employees respond to the knowledge that they are being monitored?

Don’t Go Overboard

As James Madison famously once wrote, “If all men were angels, no government would be necessary.” Or to quote a more recent U.S. president, Ronald Reagan, “Trust but verify.” Some level of employee monitoring is generally required in all work environments. Yet be careful not to take it too far.

If employees feel they are working under a microscope at all times, many will, logically, interpret this as the employer viewing them with distrust. Believing that your company considers you untrustworthy is anything but motivational.

To limit that effect, new employees and all employees on a regular basis should be told how and why your monitoring policy was developed. It should be stressed that employees are valued and trusted, and that monitoring systems can offer them as much protection as the employer to the extent it keeps any unjust accusations from being leveled against them.

About the Author
McClanathan, Burg & Associates, LLC. is a full service accounting firm. Our team members provide services including: Tax, Audit, Assurance and Accounting, Estate and Trust, Forensic Accounting, Litigation Support and Business Valuation.

Social Share

  • google-share

Search

RECENT NEWS

  • IRS Extends the Tax Filing and Paying Deadline for Individuals
  • Do you know the tax impact of your collectibles?
  • Making 2017 retirement plan contributions in 2018
  • When an elderly parent might qualify as your dependent
  • AMT Calculations: It’s Showtime

Categories

  • MBA Events
  • MBA News
  • Opinion & Editorial
  • Resources & Tips

Archives

  • March 2021
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • November 2013

Social Media

Facebook
Linked In
SavvyCard
Twitter

“Best
Congratulations to this year's honored business!
Featured in the Tampa Bay Times.
Click here to view my profile >>

Categories

  • MBA Events
  • MBA News

Archives

Sign Up For Newsletter

First Name:
Last Name:
Email Address (required):
Company:
Phone Number:
© 2014 McClanathan, Burg & Associates, LLC | Website Design by ThinkTankConnect.com

Send to Mobile

Text or Email McClanathan, Burg & Associates online business card to your mobile device using the form below
From the card you will be able to:
  • Get turn by turn directions to the company's office
  • Access a visual company directory of employee cards
  • Call, email or text the company
  • Share/Refer the company to others
  • Save the card to your phone's home screen for future access