Pretoria - The Labour Court has ordered the reinstatement of 12 employees at Cashbuild’s Klerksdorp branch who had been fired following stock shortages. The workers must also receive backpay for the time they were deemed fired.
The disgruntled employees worked in various capacities ranging from cashiers, forklift drivers and general assistants, to an assistant manager with 30 years service.
When the Labour Court turned down their application to be reinstated, they took their plight to the appeal court, which agreed that their dismissal was unfair.
The group were earlier charged with “collective misconduct/team misconduct” and dismissed after a disciplinary hearing.
Cashbuild (Pty) Ltd, is a national wholesaler and retail supplier of hardware and building materials.
It operates more than 200 stores.
In January 2016, following a stock-take, losses were detected at the Klerksdorp branch amounting to R21 871, or 0.47% of sales.
This exceeded Cashbuild’s acceptable shrinkage level of no more than 0.4% of sales. The following month, a further stock-take revealed stock shrinkage of R24 845, equivalent to 1.5% of sales.
This escalated the following month to a stock loss of R88 000. A workshop was held with the employees the same month. They were interviewed and given a questionnaire to complete in which they were asked to indicate the cause of the stock losses.
The employees were also encouraged to use an anonymous tip-off line.
As a result of the continued stock losses, in March 2016, the employees were issued with final written warnings valid for 12 months for failing to control shrinkage collectively or individually. However, three months later, stock losses in the amount of R106 848 were uncovered.
A number of deficiencies in Cashbuild’s systems were identified by the employees in the shrinkage questionnaires they completed. These included staff shortages, with a number of employees noting that the lack of a permanent end controller stationed at the exit to the store was a systemic cause of shrinkage.
Close circuit television cameras at the store not being operative were also blamed for the problem.
After a disciplinary hearing, all 12 employees which the company had suspected to have known about the origin of the theft, were found guilty and in July 2016 they were fired. They took the matter to the CCMA, which found their dismissals to be both procedurally and substantively fair.
In reviewing this before the Labour Court, they argued that Cashbuild had failed to take steps to address the problems earlier identified by the employees in their questionnaires as contributing to shrinkage. They also said the CCTV footage was not reviewed to attempt to determine the cause of the stock losses.
The workers said it was simply unfair to fire them all as it was a big shop and it could not have been expected of them all to know who the thief or thieves were.
The Labour Court, however, also dismissed their application.
Its appeal division, however, ruled in favour of the workers and said there was no evidence which indicated that, given the size of the store, employees in one section of the store would have been aware of stock being lost in another section.
It said the facts did not support an inference being drawn of the culpable participation of all employees employed at the store in the primary misconduct. Furthermore, they participated in shrinkage workshops and completed shrinkage questionnaires to identify system difficulties and made proposals to solve the problem of stock loss.
Pretoria News