Posted on 04/01/2011 2:43:34 AM PDT by Lost Dutchman
To All,
Attached, please find a copy of an addendum to the employee handbook, that regulates audio/video recording in the workplace. We will add this to the handbook and have new employees sign the sheet when they come on.
Please print, date and sign, have your supervisor or ***** sign as a witness and give to ***** for your employee file. (Commcenter can give to myself or ***** as we have your folders in here)
Any questions, please ask *****, *****, ***** or myself.
AUDIO/VIDEO RECORDING WHILE AT WORK
Effective March 31, 2011
***Company Name***. being in the Security/CCTV/Computer Security Business will, from time to time need to install Video and Audio recording devices in various work areas while employees are performing their duties.
This Video and Audio recording will only be used for testing purposes or to demonstrate the technologies that ***Company Name*** offers its Clients.
Dated:_______________________ Employee:_____________________________
Dated:_______________________ Witness:_______________________________
I currently work there part-time and do not need the job. Above is a copy of what we just received from supervison.
I personally believe that this is going too far for a simple home security company...
Advice Please? Should I gut it out? Protest and stay? Protest and quit? I do enjoy working there. The co-workers and the coffee is great.
Thanks for your input, and sorry about the vanity post.
It’s a legal move, but I would not worry about it unless you are up to no good at work.
Keep in mind you are working for them, and you don’t have privacy at work (with the exception of the bathroom). Everything else always assume big brother is watching.
If you dont need the job, quit and let someone who needs a job take it.
If you are in the security business, being recorded all of the time is a given, don’t you think?
As someone who has been out of work for more than 2 years and looked every single day, my advice is this:
If you don’t need the job (as you state), I suggest you protest and stay (until they kick your ass out for being such a troublemaker). You will be doing the angel’s work on behalf of the co-workers you are so fond of, who probably really DO need the job and are afraid to speak up. Perhaps you can adopt the role of liaison and try to work with management and come up with less draconian ways to deal with whatever problems they are trying to solve.
But if, upon further review, (as they say in the NFL) you might like to hang on to the job, be quiet for now.
For those who don’t know, it is very, very tough out there right now, looking for a job. I wouldn’t wish this economy for job-seekers on my worst enemy.
Has the coffee tasted...”funny”...lately there at work?
“This Video and Audio recording will only be used for testing purposes or to demonstrate the technologies that ***Company Name*** offers its Clients.”
Make sure you keep a copy of the letter.
Do something noteworthy in front of one of the cameras but no live witnessess.
When the boss calls you in to talk about the incident in the lunchroom - deny it. Then when he says he has it all on tape you pull out that paper with that line highlighted in yellow and yell “Neener - neener - neener. You can’t do anything because you said it was just for testing and stuff!”
Or, you do what you think is right. I need the money so I would keep my job - especially if I enjoyed it, and the co-workers and coffee is good. It is their company - so if they want to have security cameras over the employees that is their option.
You might want to think about all of the reasons why they wouldn’t be a good idea and explain that to your bosses in the best interest of the firm. (Not a protest).
They give the idea that you don’t trust the employees.
The workers might feel like they are being spied on.
Tensions may increase between workers and management.
Problems arising from miss-interpreted video shots.
Seriously - I think it really would be in the interests of the firm not to do it. Unless they are losing all of their profits to stolen notepads, post-it notes and markers.
How about a day of videoing - just enough to provide some good examples to your clients. Could even have the employees join in and stage some events to show its usefullness. Getting inside from a window/back door. Tampering with the alarm system in the back room. Rummaging through a purse on a desk, etc.
Or - quit your job. I’m sure there are plenty of folks that don’t have a job that could use the money and will do what management asks. And - that may be the response your boss gives you.
Guts it. Forget the protest. Legally speaking, audio/visual recording of employees in the workplace is a highly sensitive undertaking, particularly if it involves telephonic intercepts. The company stated it’s for testing and demo purposes. Should it attempt to use it for any other purpose, it could prove problematic.
Sorry to waste everyone’s time...
I finally realized that their company means their rules...
I must be spending too much time lurking DU thinking that civil rights trumps property rights...
Thanks for all the input...
God Bless...
I"d wish -- in fact, it's rather a fond wish -- that the Dems in Congress and Obaama all have to look for jobs in this economy.
Actually, on further consideration, I'll walk that back.
I want them all imprisoned or sold into indentured servitude (it's explicitly legal for indebtedness, according to the 13th Amendment) for what they have done to this country.
Cheers!
Sounds to me as if company legal counsel had them do this, to address any potential problems that might occur from any future improper (read: illegal) use of their equipment, by either the company itself or it’s employees acting individually.
I’m as big a privacy and civil liberties advocate as anybody, but don’t see anything particularly insidious about this. An A/V “trail” can be as useful in defending oneself as it is as evidence for accusation.
My husband is a Network Manger and the cameras at his company fall under his supervision. There are lots of them. I just asked him about the legality and he said the keywords are “expectation of privacy.” If there is no expectation of privacy, then it’s perfectly legal to put in the cameras. You can’t put them in the bathrooms, or any area of the building where they’d be expectation of privacy.
you can fulfill my ultimate fantasy...go to the resale shop, and buy a recliner...bring it into work, put it at your desk, recline back, and wait to get fired...
CCTV is nothing. Try working where you have to have the implanted chip with shock collar. I tell you, a little slow on the typing and that zap really hurts....
then buy a recliner with a cup holder....
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