Action Against Absconder

What to do in Absconded Cases?

A lot of time and effort is spent in nurturing personnel, which involves skill development, identifying training needs, reward and recognition, and creating relationships. As a result, if an employee fails to show up for work for a lengthy period of time, say more than a week, one should assume the worst and suspect an absconding case.

Such situations must be thoroughly investigated, and necessary steps taken to prevent a recurrence.

Communicating with an absconder

You can use the following sequence of steps when such an event happens in your organization. Do keep copies of all communications with the absconder on the employee file.

1. Contact the absconder telephonically and by sending an email.

2. If there is no response, then communicate by sending an official (registered or courier) letter to the last known address of the employee.

3. Quote the appropriate sections of your employee handbook and enquire about reasons for not coming to work. Ask the employee to report back immediately.

4. If no reply is received within a stipulated period, send a warning letter clearly indicating that termination action will be taken if the employee does not report back to work.

5. If no reply is received within 15 days of the warning letter, you can take a legal action by sending a notice and terminating the absconder’s employment.

Note: It is important to terminate such as employee once you have exhausted all options of trying to get in touch with the absconded employee. Keeping the employee on your roles can be a challenge in many ways.

Your statutory responsibilities

As an employer, you will still have to pay the absconder’s salary till the time he has worked in the company.

If the employee has a leave balance, the same should be either used to adjust the last working date or appropriate adjustments should be made in the final payout to the employee.

All statutory payments (such as taxes, pension fund payments, health insurance etc.) owed to the employee and government must be paid till the last date of working of the employee.

If the absconding employee owes dues to the employer, such as pending loans and advances, pre-paid dues, loaner devices etc, the employer can claim to recover these through the court. Employers can even adjust the same towards any money owed to the employee.

Do make sure that you keep all documents related to the payments and dues for at least a period of 5 years or longer (based on your local laws)

Thanks for reading hope this helps you in such absconded cases.