BPO Hires 21 Employees Accused Of Theft
By Nitin Paul

Proving once again the popular expression “It happens only in India”, the 21 employees of a BPO company in Gurgaon were absorbed by a new employer within 24 hours of being sacked for stealing money from their office. Even after a complaint was registered by the company at the Police Station of the area, the new employer did not bother to do a reference check of these sacked employees and went on to hire them.

The above fact was disclosed by none other than the Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) himself of the company Quatrro BPO Solutions, Raman Roy during a Q&A session of ‘Outsourcing Summit 2006’ held recently in Gurgaon by Confederation of Indian Industries (CII).

It was there a participant asked the panelists including Raman Roy whether or not there is going to be any regulation to check employees-poaching in the IT and ITeS sector that is facing huge talent pool deficit. At this, Raman Roy who was also moderating the session opted to reply to the query and said that it did not require any regulation. He said that poaching practices could be stopped only through self governance methods such as reference checks of the employees they were hiring.

Raman Roy went on to say that the employers in the IT & ITeS sector unfortunately did not bother to refer to the previous employer to check the credentials of the employee they were hiring. While citing an example of one of his past companies, Roy said that 21 employees of one of his previous companies had got fresh jobs within 24 hours of being sacked for stealing money from the office.

It was also despite the fact that a complaint to this regard was registered in the Police Station and FIR was registered on the insistence of Quatrro. Raman Roy lamented that the new employer did not bother to do a reference check of these sacked employees who came back to show him the appointment letters with great pride.

Quatrro is a BPO company founded by Raman Roy. The company provides a range of vertical and horizontal service offerings which are targeted towards global clients in North America, Europe and Asia.

However, one of the panelists Jatender Mehta who is the chairman of Haryana State Council of CII informed that auto ancillaries and OEM suppliers to auto majors like Maruti Suzuki, Hero Honda and others had started doing ‘reference checks’ of the new employees. Mehta, who is also the managing director of Omax Autos Ltd, suggested that the IT and ITeS companies also could follow the example and do proper reference checks.