Chairman of the Bahamas Electricity Corporation (BEC) Leslie Miller is pushing for jail time for workers who are accused of abusing the government-run corporation’s overtime system.
According to reports, an internal audit into the overtime pay at BEC leading up to September 30, 2012 revealed that overtime pay for employees totalled over $11.8 million for the year.
That shows an increase of 13.4 per cent over the previous year, reports said.
This overtime was paid to 49 employees and the overtime pay ranged from 75 per cent to 100 per cent of their basic pay.
The total amount of workers receiving overtime pay was 876, according to the report.
The report also indicates that in some instances the take home was more than $100,000 when added to the basic pay.
Auditors bemoaned the overtime pay out saying that it was “physically impossible, highly dangerous or simply questionable when one considers the law of diminishing marginal productivity.”
Authorities added ,“ There seems to be no consequences for management failures to manage overtime and the effort to reconsidering hiring additional staff to curtail the excessive overtime worked.”
While speaking with reporters yesterday, Mr. Miller said some action has to be taken.
“The employees saw an increase of $1.3 million for 12 months and it is projected that if we don’t stop this the cost for overtime could exceed $12 million. This has got to stop,” he said.
“We are talking to the accounting firm. Our job is to as soon as humanly possible put that report in the hands of police. We have to because that is the Bahamian’s people money. We must be responsible for what takes place in the corporation.”
Mr. Miller confirmed that all of the employees accused of abusing the overtime system are still in place at the corporation.
“You see them on the streets doing nothing and they don’t start work until about 4:00 p.m. when overtime kicks in,” he said.
“Even in Hurricane Sandy, overtime for that was about $96,000 and it does not stop. We must stop it.”
The chairman said he expects the auditors to finish the complete report in the next 30 days.
