Company uses keystroke technology to fire employee
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An employee in Australia was let go from her job after her company used keystroke technology to ascertain how much she was working.
This is according to a report by News.com.au published on Tuesday.
Suzie Cheikho filed a complaint with Australia’s Fair Work Commission (FWC) alleging that her employer Insurance Australia Group (IAG) had a “premeditated plan to remove her from the business and that she was targeted due to her mental health issues.”
Claim rejected
However, her claim was rejected by FWC which responded that there was a “valid reason of misconduct” to fire Cheikho. Cheikho was with the major insurance company for 18 years before her dismissal.
Further investigation into the matter showed that the employee missed deadlines and meetings, was often absent and uncontactable, and did not perform a task which caused the industry regulator to fine her company.
News.com.au further reported that Cheikho had received a formal warning in November 2022 about her work performance and was included in an improvement plan to try and fix her output.
A keystroke technology was then used to analyze the number of times she physically touched her keyboard on 49 working days from October to December.
The results indicated that she was often late or even absent: she started late on 47 days, left early on 29 days and did not perform any hours of work on 4 days, claimed News.com.au.
Cheikho passionately refuted these findings.
“Sometimes the workload is a bit slow, but I have never not worked,” she was reported as saying to her managers according to the FWC.
“I mean, I may go to the shops from time to time, but that is not for the entire day. I need to take some time to consider this and I will put forward a response”.
Making matters worse, Cheikho provided a written response where she claimed she “really can’t recall why or how it’s that low.”
No explanation found
“I have tried to go through emails and messages to see if I can explain it,” she attempted to explain.
“I have been going through a lot of personal issues which has caused a decline to my mental health and unfortunately I believe it has affected my performance and my work.”
In the end all this worked against her with FWC Deputy President Thomas Roberts stating that the employee “was not working as she was required to do during her designated working hours.”
“The applicant’s application is therefore dismissed,” concluded Roberts, according to News.com.au.
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