Reimbursing gift purchase of illegal substance
Discussion
I'm wondering how I should deal with a situation if it ever arose where one of our salespeople purchased some form of illegal substance to the value of say £20 to give to a customer?
How should it be presented on their expense form and how would we legitimise the reimbursement?
What's our liability as a company - if that ever happened?
We obviously don't condone illegal activity so we'd obviously deal with disciplinary aspect but wouldn't want the employee to be out of pocket.
How should it be presented on their expense form and how would we legitimise the reimbursement?
What's our liability as a company - if that ever happened?
We obviously don't condone illegal activity so we'd obviously deal with disciplinary aspect but wouldn't want the employee to be out of pocket.
Pistom said:
I'm wondering how I should deal with a situation if it ever arose where one of our salespeople purchased some form of illegal substance to the value of say £20 to give to a customer?
How should it be presented on their expense form and how would we legitimise the reimbursement?
What's our liability as a company - if that ever happened?
We obviously don't condone illegal activity so we'd obviously deal with disciplinary aspect but wouldn't want the employee to be out of pocket.
How you deal with it is by making sure it doesn’t arise. Your expenses policy should set out what isn’t an acceptable expense, and that should include the purchase of anything illegal (and probably anything immoral, if you want to go down that route).How should it be presented on their expense form and how would we legitimise the reimbursement?
What's our liability as a company - if that ever happened?
We obviously don't condone illegal activity so we'd obviously deal with disciplinary aspect but wouldn't want the employee to be out of pocket.
DanL said:
How you deal with it is by making sure it doesn’t arise. Your expenses policy should set out what isn’t an acceptable expense, and that should include the purchase of anything illegal (and probably anything immoral, if you want to go down that route).
It would put quite a few drug dealers and titty bars out of business in London if that was the case. LaterLosers said:
DanL said:
How you deal with it is by making sure it doesn’t arise. Your expenses policy should set out what isn’t an acceptable expense, and that should include the purchase of anything illegal (and probably anything immoral, if you want to go down that route).
It would put quite a few drug dealers and titty bars out of business in London if that was the case. 
DanL said:
... if anyone’s still taking a client to a strip club in the 2020’s then I’ll be amazed. I’m also clearly in the wrong industry.
A groundworks contractor I could name in Exeter certainly does so - and puts it through on expenses.As to the OP's question, if an employee handed me an expenses claim for purchasing an illegal substance for a client, I'd reciprocate by handing him his P45.
All great responses as usual here, particularly the one about my comment being contradictory. I agree and have difficulty with that myself as we try operate a non judgemental policy.
But I'm going off thread.
It's a hypothetical question which boils down to how do you reimburse someone who's done something illegal and what's the consequences of doing so.
Obviously there's other gifts they could choose.
But I'm going off thread.
It's a hypothetical question which boils down to how do you reimburse someone who's done something illegal and what's the consequences of doing so.
Obviously there's other gifts they could choose.
Pistom said:
It's a hypothetical question which boils down to how do you reimburse someone who's done something illegal and what's the consequences of doing so.
I must be due a parrot here, why do you feel the need to reimburse something they’re not entitled to have reimbursed? What a strange mentality.Pistom said:
It's a hypothetical question which boils down to how do you reimburse someone who's done something illegal and what's the consequences of doing so.
Simple: you don'tAnd if you do, I suspect you would be guiilty of some sort of offence of dealing in the illegal substance yourself (you would, after all, be funding its procurement).
juggsy said:
I must be due a parrot here, why do you feel the need to reimburse something they’re not entitled to have reimbursed? What a strange mentality.
The other obvious question is why the juddering f
k did they think it would be even slightly appropriate or acceptable to buy such an item for a client? What sort of an outfit are you running that makes employees think that this is a sensible thing to do?
My question has been answered now thanks everyone.
In response to those saying they'd be sacked, yes in the real world that's what would probably happen and I did say we'd deal with the disciplinary aspect but the difficulty comes when you try to have a non judgemental policy and the employee uses the gift to leverage high levels of business.
As someone said above, the expense policy needs to be more robust.
In response to those saying they'd be sacked, yes in the real world that's what would probably happen and I did say we'd deal with the disciplinary aspect but the difficulty comes when you try to have a non judgemental policy and the employee uses the gift to leverage high levels of business.
As someone said above, the expense policy needs to be more robust.
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