posted 08-31-2007 12:02 AM            

A security company wants to polygraph an employee who is placed at a business that experienced a nighttime theft while the security employee was on duty.

The employee claims to have noticed nothing, including noise or activity from the security company's dog or other activity.

The security company itself has incurred no loss, but anticipates a potential loss if they satisfy the claim of the business that contracted their service and incurred the loss.

The security employee is not employed by the company that incurred the loss.

The security company wants to polygraph the employee regarding whether he was physically present (on site) at the time the theft occured. They are suspicious about his complicity, but that is vague.

Question:

Is this a testable situation under EPPA?

r

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"Gentlemen, you can't fight in here. This is the war room."
--(Stanley Kubrick/Peter Sellers - Dr. Strangelove, 1964)

posted 08-31-2007 07:51 AM            

The employee is not employed by the company that had the loss.

posted 08-31-2007 08:06 AM            

That's what I was thinking too. I asked the company to check with their legal counsel before proceeding.

Too bad. It looked like an interesting case.

Here's another one.

Hotel guest has some missing items, valuable property and some cash. The hotel employees are suspect. Can the hotel request the employee submit to a polygraph?

The hotel itself can show no loss. The posted policies are no liability for property - hotel safe is available.

I say, this one too is asking for trouble.

Any different perspectives?

r

------------------
"Gentlemen, you can't fight in here. This is the war room."
--(Stanley Kubrick/Peter Sellers - Dr. Strangelove, 1964)

posted 08-31-2007 09:52 AM            

gettin' the 10-footer now - to push it away.

posted 08-31-2007 09:57 AM            

A housekeeper - long-term (years), but employed by an agency. Missing cash and valuable property. No police report yet.

Family (employer?) wants to polygraph before deciding whether to file police report or discharge.

I said no way, unless there is a police report first, then there can be no adverse action from the polygraph - its simply information for the investigation.

We still have the problem of whom is the employer.

Is this one bad too?

There must be some media thing happening because everyone wants a friggin' polygraph.

Usually, its three EPPA referrals a year. Now, its three this week.

posted 08-31-2007 02:25 PM            

EPPA, as explained to me by an attorney who watched it happen, was supposed to allow for specific-issue testing for business employers, but after agreeing to the unseen law, we got what we have today. They quickly learned - after they had been bamboozled and the law was in effect - that such testing had, in all practicality, been outlawed. They had no energy to fight the fight again. Since then, such tests have been nearly impossible to meet the rigid standards of EPPA.

Think about this one: imagine a legit EPPA test occurring and the person is cleared. Then, based on that NDI, the employer uses that info to narrow down the pool and wants to focus on, let's say, the only other possible violator. Zing! Probable EPPA violation because polygraph results were used against another - even if the first person took the test on his own with no input from anyone. Crazy, huh?

Wasn't this Ted Kennedy's doing? What does he have against the truth being discovered?

It's incredible how one little type can mess up the whole paragraph, but I fixed it before you saw it!