Reply to: Asked for an extension and got fired!

[wim121]

It's called corroborating evidence. It backs up your story.

When people are having difficulty with employers, clients or agencies, I always recommend documentating any untoward events. It doesn't prove anything, but should it come to court, it makes your testimony appear considerably more reliable.

Thank you, that is the point I was trying to make but might not have worded well.

Doesn't prove a thing. All it proves is that you went to the shop around the corner from client co and to the petrol station. It doesn't prove you were at the client site.

It may be good working practice to keep receipts for claiming expenses, but it isn't evidence in a court of law to prove you worked at a client site. To think otherwise is somewhat dillusional. However, if you have a court case that contradicts everything I have said, by all means publish it on this thread and I will be more than happy to read it.

I appreciate what you're saying and you may be right, if the police/cps want to nail you, it may not completely prove your innocence.

But wouldn't such supporting evidence, if you were a juror, place a seed of reasonable doubt in your mind as opposed to no explanation or supplementary evidence at all? Isn't it better to have something, rather than nothing at all to support ones account of what happened?

Even if the police would take your word for it that the information is genuine and factual, you are risking the client in sueing you for theft and breach of contract, especially if you own up to taking the information from the client. Just in case you don't know, any information, ranging from Event Logs from a computer to taking a whole database (or financial information) constitutes as theft. If you want to risk being sued and you think you will no doubtly win, go for it. You may also get done under the Computer Misues Act (I am not 100% on this, and I will need to double check if I can be arsed).

Actually you may be right, one would have to check their contract in such a situation. I wouldnt consider it as a removal of any confidential data as one wouldnt copy data from a server, just error logs from a workstation.

However as you said, it is a very thorny area!

Indeed, but providing it then enables the police to seize and verify your accounts. That was just one method I suggested.

So, I can't print out the event viewer then?
In that case, what are you printing out? I ask because I'd like to print it out, that's all

Just press ctrl+p in event viewer having highlighted the event. I would however print a screenshot.

There are programs you can run that will print out selected errors, so power on and off for instance, like this one, but as pmeswani pointed out, then installing or running unauthorised software could fall under computer misuse.






I think all of this falls under, you're damned if you do and damned if you dont do anything to protect yourself!

I think the only thing we can all agree on as a consensus, is the OP shouldnt take part in this behaviour and change contracts asap >>

[manclarky]

[QUOTE=wim121;1488444]Indeed, but providing it then enables the police to seize and verify your accounts. That was just one method I suggested.QUOTE]

So, I can't print out the event viewer then?
In that case, what are you printing out? I ask because I'd like to print it out, that's all

[pmeswani]

It's called corroborating evidence. It backs up your story.

When people are having difficulty with employers, clients or agencies, I always recommend documentating any untoward events. It doesn't prove anything, but should it come to court, it makes your testimony appear considerably more reliable.

I hate to say this, but Event Logs are not corroborating evidence. It can be forged, faked, etc. Emails are harder to fake, especially if you retain the headers (i.e. forward an email as an attachment). However, one would have to be careful not to forward emails to an external email address or external storage that may contain Company Confidential / Restricted information.

[NotAllThere]

...Doesn't prove a thing. All it proves is that you went to the shop around the corner from client co and to the petrol station. It doesn't prove you were at the client site....

It's called corroborating evidence. It backs up your story.

When people are having difficulty with employers, clients or agencies, I always recommend documentating any untoward events. It doesn't prove anything, but should it come to court, it makes your testimony appear considerably more reliable.

[pmeswani]

Indeed, but providing it then enables the police to seize and verify your accounts.

No it wouldn't. Even if the police would take your word for it that the information is genuine and factual, you are risking the client in sueing you for theft and breach of contract, especially if you own up to taking the information from the client. Just in case you don't know, any information, ranging from Event Logs from a computer to taking a whole database (or financial information) constitutes as theft. If you want to risk being sued and you think you will no doubtly win, go for it. You may also get done under the Computer Misues Act (I am not 100% on this, and I will need to double check if I can be arsed).

That was just one method I suggested. You could save your receipts from the shop around the corner or petrol station, anything really, any supporting evidence that backs up your story.

Doesn't prove a thing. All it proves is that you went to the shop around the corner from client co and to the petrol station. It doesn't prove you were at the client site.

I always save every receipt and make sure my hours are plausible and get something on the way home for instance. I know a couple of people that have submitted receipts to an umbrella co. and then thrown them away. Later in the year, HMRC gives them an audit and they have no receipts to back up their allowance claims which makes life very difficult. Ask most umbrella companies or accountants and they may give you the same advice, save receipts, back up your hours to a reasonable degree.

In short, it is just good working practice, whether you're working in a dodgy situation or not.

It may be good working practice to keep receipts for claiming expenses, but it isn't evidence in a court of law to prove you worked at a client site. To think otherwise is somewhat dillusional. However, if you have a court case that contradicts everything I have said, by all means publish it on this thread and I will be more than happy to read it.

[wim121]

Even if the OP could print out the Event Log, the chances of it being accepted as evidence in a court of law would be slim to nil unless he was able to prove that the print out was forensically obtained.

Indeed, but providing it then enables the police to seize and verify your accounts. That was just one method I suggested. You could save your receipts from the shop around the corner or petrol station, anything really, any supporting evidence that backs up your story.

I always save every receipt and make sure my hours are plausible and get something on the way home for instance. I know a couple of people that have submitted receipts to an umbrella co. and then thrown them away. Later in the year, HMRC gives them an audit and they have no receipts to back up their allowance claims which makes life very difficult. Ask most umbrella companies or accountants and they may give you the same advice, save receipts, back up your hours to a reasonable degree.

In short, it is just good working practice, whether you're working in a dodgy situation or not.

[pmeswani]

I did a Google search and found this - which implies you can't print out the event viewer!

Is there a way to print out the event log? : WindowsAdminPrintEventLog

Even if the OP could print out the Event Log, the chances of it being accepted as evidence in a court of law would be slim to nil unless he was able to prove that the print out was forensically obtained.

[manclarky]

How do you do that?

I did a Google search and found this - which implies you can't print out the event viewer!

Is there a way to print out the event log? : WindowsAdminPrintEventLog

[manclarky]

print out an event viewer of his work PC

How do you do that?

[SajStars]

Who were the managers working for? Are they employed by the client, or [and don't flame me here for being presumtious and judgmental, I know I am] working for one of the Indian consultancies?

The managers had been working directly for the charity for a number of years as permi's (5yrs). One was an African and the other an Indian. Between both of them they could control what was going on.

They hired another couple of contractors in order for g's. Greed - always catches people out!

[JoJoGabor]

Who were the managers working for? Are they employed by the client, or [and don't flame me here for being presumtious and judgmental, I know I am] working for one of the Indian consultancies?

[northernladuk]

Thanks for all the advice. It does seem a little clearer now. I got caught up in a rut of a job and just lived with the problems.

You have to apply a bit of brutal honesty here and ask yourself were you part of the problem and address the issues. There is always two sides to the story. If you want to fix them you have to be honest to both sides of the story. If you want to push it under the carpet and risk causing issues at your next gig just blame your cilent.

[SajStars]

Live and learn for your next role - as a contractor keep your head down and nose clean (metaphorically speaking)...

Thanks for all the advice. It does seem a little clearer now. I got caught up in a rut of a job and just lived with the problems.

[wim121]

As I said in the other thread and will repeat here:


In response to you and all the others here, Im a bit late to this, but I would say to the OP, as well as submitting honest timesheets, print out an event viewer of his work PC. That way, if the tulip hits the fan and the police lay out his timesheets if someone tries to accuse him, he can then say, here is proof of when my work PC was started up and shut down, backing up my submitted hours.

That is what I would do in this situation. One piece of evidence is never enough. You need to be smart and back up that evidence to make it airtight. Saving receipts, like a petrol one on the way home is always good practise for a contractor for expenses, but in this case, can further prove you left work when you said you did.




As someone else said, far easier for you to keep it in one thread. Personally I would never have posted any of this at all, as keeping quiet about fraud is a crime as well.

[Wanderer]

OK, so presuming this is not a troll....

What your manager proposed amounts to fraud against the client company and if you go along with it then you are party to that fraud. This is a very, very dangerous situation where you could face criminal charges. If you are not a EU national then you could have your work permit revoked.

I would have secretly recorded the conversation for "insurance" purposes where I discussed exactly what they were proposing to do and then flatly refused to be party to the fraud.

Like nomadd says - get the hell out of there and don't EVER, EVER cross the line into criminal behaviour.