Question:
We gave a friend a job about 2 years ago to assist in running one of the divisions of our property related business.
At the end of last year, we had a discussion with the employee (after hearing he did a property deal privately) and we all agreed (verbally) that any new deals (regardless of when the origonated) would be shared between the employee and our company because (1) a large amount of the deal is done during work hours-his job is full time and (2) any time spent on other projects is an opportunity cost for the division that he is running. The agreement was put into writing a few months later.
Unfortunately, we found out that the said employee was
(1) Using working hours, our work driver and business petrol for his personal business interests, most of which was done during the working hours that we were employing him for.
(2) Was given a property deal opportunity from a previous partner and used the system that our business pays membership in order to source the property and gain the information of the seller, this was all done during working hours. The tenant was in discussion a while back with a family member of the employee but the transaction of purchase and closing the tenancy deal was concluded during employment at our business.
(3) The employee used a contact of mine to finance the above-mentioned property deal and lied when initially asked what he used my contact for when I first found out. (After further evidence, he did admit)
I’d like to know:
1. Is my business entitled to the said property?
2. Is my business allowed to claim damages for (1) employment time, (2) driver and gas usage and (3) opportunity cost? How would we come to such a calculation?
Many thanks
Answer:
From what I understand it would seem that this deal falls into the contract you had with the employee which allows him to do the work on company time and use company resources but he must share the deal with you. Therefore, it would seem that the only question relevant is the first and it would seem from what you write that he should share it with you since you have a partnership agreement.
It is difficult to really pasken bec. he may have different version of what transpired-so just take this as a reaction based on one-sided information.
