Employee Theft Behavior

Abstract

Employee theft has becoming a serious and challenging issue for all businesses, especially to hotel organizations where employees have easy access to cash, amenities, and other inventories and items. This research is based on the theory of planned behavior, equity theory, and reinforcement theory to study the factors affecting employee theft behavior as well as the moderating effect of the internal control system in the hotel industry in Vietnam. Data were collected through 312 questionnaire responses and 9 in-depth interviews. The results confirmed that personal characteristics, opportunities, unfair compensations, injustice, and unethical working environment do affect stealing behavior at work. Moreover, the internal control system is proved to moderate the attitude and intention to steal to stealing behavior relationships. These results will provide an essential reference for both academicians and professionals to conduct further empirical validation or develop appropriate internal programs to prevent hotel employee theft behaviors.

Dealing with hotel customer stealing practices: a managerial perspective

“…Furthermore, it is not the guests only who steal; hotel employees are also caught stealing. Individual characteristics, discrimination in reimbursement, chances, prejudice and unethical working environment also influence employees’ stealing behavior (Nguyen and Truong, 2021).…”

“…Harris and Magrizos (2021), Nguyen and Truong (2021), Fong et al (2017), Harris and Reynolds (2004) What financial consequences do hotels face as a result?…”

“…Additionally, the hotel's locations, design, structure, proximity to other accommodation units and the quality of the hotel security are the primary reasons affecting the theft incidents on hotel premises. In contrast, just a handful of studies report thefts committed by tourists (Pratt, 2022; Nguyen and Truong, 2021).…”

“…The previous studies on stealing in hotels investigate numerous dimensions of the problem. The study by Robina-Ram ırez et al (2021) investigates hotel employee misconduct, by Nguyen and Truong (2021) explores the behavior of employees who rein in pilferage and by Srivastava and Madan (2022) explores the unethical behavior of hotel employees. However, researchers have yet to address the investigation into the stealing practices of customers in hotels.…”