Janitors get access to virtually every area of a building, including your office, when nobody else is around. Your office is the center of your firm's brand, image and reputation locally. Your office may be house to the firm's intellectual residence, trade secrets, or proprietary info such as customer lists and price sheets. You may even keep the names, addresses, phone numbers, social security quantities and dates of birth of your clients and workers in your workplace. Is this information safe? What have you any idea about your office cleaner? Provides your janitor been convicted of a criminal offense of violence? Can be your janitor an unlawful or undocumented employee, a violent felon, a medication addict, a corporate spy, or an identification thief?
A single case of identity theft could cost your firm thousands of dollars, hundreds of hours of labor to fix, and cause enormous harm to your firm's brand, image and popularity among your visitors and employees. Identification theft figures are staggering. The Javelin Technique and Research Center recently reported:
• There have been 10 million victims of identity theft in 2008 in the usa, a 22% boost over 2007
• 1 atlanta divorce attorneys 10 U.S. consumers provides been victimized by identification theft
• Up to 55% of victims take 4-12 weeks to correct the damage from identity theft
• In 2008, existing account fraud in the U.S. totaled $31 billion
• The common victim loses between $851 and $1,378 out-of-pocket trying to solve identity theft
• 47% of victims have complications qualifying for a fresh loan
• 70% of victims encounter problems removing negative information from their credit reports
• Businesses across the globe lose $221 billion a year because of identity theft
• Stolen files and wallets account for almost half of most identity theft (43%).
Evidence https://rentbuynsell.com developed during the past few years points to an unmistakable and irrefutable connection between unlawful or undocumented employees employed as janitors, and identity theft and other crimes. The crime of identity theft is generally committed for two reasons; personal advantage or document fraud. There were several stories in the media about janitors committing identification theft.
In Seattle, 2 janitors were accused of stealing the identities of 181 people and working up thousands of dollars in charges. The janitors stated they stole the info by rummaging through business files, including personnel data files. In Florida, a http://www.sararussellinteriors.com/steps-to-tackle-junk-removal-in-your-home/ janitor was billed with stealing the identity of an attorney whose office he cleaned, selling shares of share owned by the attorney, and running up $20,000 in credit cards charges.
The U.S. Lawyer for the western district of Washington reported that 2 http://edition.cnn.com/search/?text=office cleaning company janitors, while used at a janitorial organization working during the night in a U.S. Bank branch, stole details on a lot more than 200 lender customers. Using that info, the janitors opened up credit accounts in the customers' names, and signed up for online banking. Using the credit cards accounts, they purchased expensive items such as for example laptop flat screen televisions, computers and airline tickets. Using online banking they paid their personal bills and transferred money to checking accounts that they then drained. They also submitted modification of address requests online so that the clients did not obtain bank statements alerting them to the issue. The indictment charged the janitors with more than $200,000 in fraud.
While a significant portion of identity theft is committed for financial gain, identity theft is also perpetrated for the purpose collecting personal data to sell to document forgers or organized identify theft bands. In NY, a janitor at open public radio station WNYC was charged with stealing a listing of the station's donors and selling it to an identification theft ring.
The sad truth is that lots of cleaning contractors hire individuals that they know, or should know, are illegal aliens. Many cleaning businesses simply choose to accept identification records presented by employment candidates at face worth even when there is an apparent http://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=office cleaning company discrepancy. Failing to verify that workers are who they say they are and qualified to receive employment in the U.S. unnecessarily subjects building owners, managers and tenants to unacceptable threat of damage and potential legal liability. The seriousness of this risk can be demonstrated by two recent cases.
In November, 2009, a lot more than 1,200 janitors employed by a janitorial services contractor were fired in Minnesota if they were unable to provide the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement with proof their legal position in the usa. Almost all the 1,200 fired workers turned out to be "undocumented." These unlawful aliens may have dedicated several felonies: document fraud, perjury on an I-9 form, and identity theft if the cultural security number or additional personally identifying information utilized by the unlawful alien belonged to another person. By failing woefully to verify that these persons were eligible for work in the United States, this cleaning contractor exposed its clients, including building owners, managers and tenants, to significant criminal and financial liability beneath the Immigration Reform and Control Action of 1986.
The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, 8 U.S.C 1324a(1), particularly prohibits the hiring of an alien not really authorized to legally function in america. A much lesser-known section of this law, 8 U.S.C 1324a(4), provides that an entity that runs on the agreement or subcontract to obtain the labor of an alien realizing that the alien can be an unauthorized alien regarding performing such labor, will be considered to possess hired the alien for employment in violation of legislation. WalMart Stores, Inc. was reminded of this law the hard method. While avoiding criminal costs, WalMart agreed to pay an archive $11 million in fines to the government to solve charges alleging the employment of unlawful aliens by the independent contractors WalMart retained to provide janitorial solutions. The investigation resulted in the arrests of over 350 allegedly unlawful aliens. The cleaning contractors that employed the undocumented aliens and placed them in WalMart shops plead guilty to criminal immigration costs and agreed to pay an additional total of $4 million in fines.
While no one action, or group of actions, can ever provide 100% safety against identity theft or other crimes committed by a janitor, there are several actions that must definitely be taken to mitigate risk in connection with signing a contract for janitorial services.
Due diligence. Investigate whether the cleaning contractor has ever been associated with hiring unlawful aliens. The web is a very important tool in this respect. Search the internet under the name of the company and check the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement site. If a company includes a background of hiring unlawful immigrants, you would be well-advised to hire a different contractor.
Criminal History Check. Make certain the washing contractor https://businesspartnermagazine.com conducts an considerable criminal background check on all workers. Insist that appropriate vocabulary covering this aspect be contained in your contract.
E-Verify. A police arrest records check, without more, could be insufficient to detect persons with criminal records. Here's why. Some U.S. citizens, in order to hide extensive criminal histories, will provide a cleaning contractor with a false name and fake proof of identity. If a criminal background check is operate using this fraudulent info, the results may come back again showing no criminal background when in fact that person has an comprehensive criminal record. The Department of Homeland Security's E-Verify System confirms the identification of each employee by comparing info from the employee's I-9 form against 444 million records in the Sociable Security Administration database and 60 million records in the Division of Homeland Security's immigration databases. E-Verify allows the contractor to determine whether see your face is definitely who he says he is and confirms the reliability of https://en.search.wordpress.com/?src=organic&q=office cleaning company the identifying info which will be submitted for the background check. In addition, E-Verify determines the eligibility of each employee to work in the United States. Research indicates that illegal immigrants generally are not "undocumented." They commonly possess bogus paperwork such as counterfeit social security cards, forged drivers licenses, fake "green cards," and phony birth certificates. Experts believe that around 75 percent of illegal aliens use counterfeit interpersonal security cards to acquire employment. The E-Verify Program helps identify this fraud. Just before signing any contract for cleaning services, make sure appropriate vocabulary requiring the utilization of E-Verify is roofed in the contract.
By following these simple recommendations, a building owner, manager or tenant can:
(1) significantly decrease the risk that a janitor utilized by a cleaning provider will engage in identity theft, corporate espionage, or various other serious crimes against individuals or property in facilities under their control,
(2) prevent cleaning support outages due to having their cleaning contractor turn off, imprisoned or fined by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and
(3) avoid potential criminal liability and large civil fines arising from your cleaning contractor's illegal conduct.