my guys stealing romex?

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danickstr

Senior Member
how do you buy it? 250's or 1000's.

you can go through a house and sort of estimate how many runs you see and how long they are. Then add 5-10% and check against what you put on the job.

If it is mainly small pulls from service calls, have them itemize the billed romex on each job, and see if it adds up.
 
Ruff-N

Ruff-N

Member
The Nerve of Some

The Nerve of Some

Also keep up with how much Romex you are having to order and how often. I worked for a shop that you could walk in and load up with what ever material you needed, we had 2 workers who would load up their van with lots of romex, eventully the boss found out what was happening when the rest of us started to complain about the lack of romex. Sure enough some detective work by the boss and the thiefs got caught and fired, these guys were selling the cut up rolls of romex as scrap. Thats what we were told, after that the boss kept a closer eye on his material.
 
480sparky

480sparky

Senior Member
Location
Iowegia
Ruff-N said:
Also keep up with how much Romex you are having to order and how often. I worked for a shop that you could walk in and load up with what ever material you needed, we had 2 workers who would load up their van with lots of romex, eventully the boss found out what was happening when the rest of us started to complain about the lack of romex. Sure enough some detective work by the boss and the thiefs got caught and fired, these guys were selling the cut up rolls of romex as scrap. Thats what we were told, after that the boss kept a closer eye on his material.
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Requiring the supply house to demand a PO will stop that in short order. Another method is to only allow certain employees the 'luxury' of ordering whatever they want.

One time, a fellow employee got fired (not for stealing material) so my helper & I got the fun job of picking up the pieces of the job he was doing. He had been trimming out a house. We found something like 27 4-ways, 80 3-ways, etc. More than enough material to trim 2-3 houses.

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We could only assume he was 'acquiring' that much material so he could one day do some side work.
 
kwired

kwired

Electron manager
Location
NE Nebraska
480sparky said:
...We could only assume he was 'acquiring' that much material so he could one day do some side work.
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I think that 'one day' was probably very near and he needed the material soon. He was not sneaking out a piece here and there he was filling an order all at once. May have been doing side work as a supply house instead of an installer.

You didn't need to post his picture did you?
 
e57

e57

Senior Member
Location
San Francisco, CA
Why is it you suspect theft? Go to the job, see if the wire is going up across and down - instead of just across. They might even be leaving 3-4' of slack everywhere. (I guy I recently did work for pretty much demanded that, to allow moving stuff, but boy did it feel wierd/stupid. And it did eat an awefull lot of wire)


Or just make a habit of dropping hints like "Wow - this place is eating a lot of wire... Lets take a look at consumption and waste down there, I'll need to adjust take-offs...." Listen for the explaination/excuse...
 
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jmellc

Senior Member
Location
Durham, NC
Occupation
Facility Maintenance Tech. Licensed Electrician
Unfortunately, we have our share of thieves in this business. Some guys see the boss as a sucker to be drained to the max. Also some guys who waste material to the extremes. I use to see guys waste a lot of EMT by using brand new bundles to cut up for stakes, when they had scrap piles with lots of good stake material. If possible, the boss should parcel out material to the crews and tell them to call him if they need more. He should make a surprise visit every now and then. My 1st employer had a superintendent that would sometimes park a block away from the site and walk in quietly. More than once, I turned around for something and there he was, observing. Gave me the creeps at the time, but I see why he felt the need to do that. If your boss can quietly sneak in, he may overhear conversations, see thefts, waste, etc. Also ride by nearby eating places and check for stretched out meal breaks.

I'm still mostly a 1 horse outfit. If I have someone for a few days and need to send him for stuff, I call in and OK it for him to pick up. So far, 1 trip 1 call. No one yet has blanket clearance and my suppliers know that.
 
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ksmith846

Senior Member
Location
Port St Lucie, Florida
-=PEAKABOO=- said:
Does anyone have any tips on marking romex so that you can keeps tabs on whether or not the guys are putting it in the walls and not taking it??
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I honestly beleive you need to hire the right people. Maybe I have just been lucky, but I have 4 foreman that each have a company credit card, big box credit cards, fuel cards, and open PO system at the supply houses. I have not even once worried if they would steal material because I trust them. It has worked for me.
 
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realolman

Senior Member
How do you bid jobs without having any idea how much material it's gonna take?

I can order anything I want, and they'll get it..... It wouldn't even cross my mind to orderi anything I didn't think we needed. And I wouldn't take any of it off the job.

I hope my boss appreciates that.

I know I appreciate that he has bought some stuff that I ordered, that I was surprised about ....without asking a single question.
 
ceb58

ceb58

Senior Member
Location
Raeford, NC
I honestly believe you need to hire the right people
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.

There is the answer.

Originally Posted by -=PEAKABOO=-
Does anyone have any tips on marking romex so that you can keeps tabs on whether or not the guys are putting it in the walls and not taking it??
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When figuring material for a house I go with 1000ft of 14-2 per 1000 sq ft, 500ft of 12-2 per 1000 sq ft. If they are calling for more excessive amounts of wire then you need to be on the job looking at what is going on.
 
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rodneee

Senior Member
i got taken

i got taken

about 8 years ago a local supply house asked me if i would accept 14/2 in 250 foot rolls wrapped in HOME DEPOT PACKAGING....they said the factory over estimated how much they would sell ....so my supply house guy said i would be doing him a favor so i said ok.... well word got out that home depot would take back their wire without a receipt....i will never know how much these guys took...
 
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Ohmy

Senior Member
Location
Atlanta, GA
rodneee said:
about 8 years ago a local supply house asked me if i would accept 14/2 in 250 foot rolls wrapped in HOME DEPOT PACKAGING....they said the factory over estimated how much they would sell ....so my supply house guy said i would be doing him a favor so i said ok.... well word got out that home depot would take back their wire without a receipt....i will never know how much these guys took...
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This is major problem. HD bid room is the cheapest place to buy wire but its scary dangerous to leave anything from home depot laying around because HD returns for store credit anything.

Think about this...you send a guy to run a call. He goes to home depot to get two rolls of wire (says he is running some long runs, etc.). He walks out of the HD and turns around and walks right into to returns and gets $60 credit for one roll of wire. Almost impossible to detect and your paying him while he does it.
 
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rodneee

Senior Member
Rewire said:
Give the man a cigar,you can't run your business from the office you need to be out in the field.
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i bought the business from a guy ready to retire...i had zero knowledge of the industry @ the time....he stayed on for two years as part of our agreement...during those two years all i did was visit 10 to 20 jobsites every day...it struck me as odd that he never left his office...when i asked him about it he said something like "would a tugboat captain leave the bridge?" ...i just said that will change when i takeover...31 years later i rarely leave the office...POINT BEING MANY DIFFERENT MANAGEMENT STYLES EXIST AND WILL WORK..
 
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