Seeking advice regarding unethical business practices:

[V4Victory]

Very interesting, thank you for the link Dave A.

[Blurock]

Was there no secrecy clause or a clause preventing moonlighting in her employment contract?

Employment contracts are important as it forms the basis of the employer/employee relationship.

[V4Victory]

Hi Blurock, she came in as a partner and begged me to work on this specific clients contract – which I foolishly allowed, in retrospect...and due to the initial print deadline on this project I had not completed or entered into any written contractual agreement at that time as those details were still being negotiated. We did agree on certain fundamental industry criterion verbally though.
I appreciate that verbal agreements are not as convincing and compelling as a written contractual agreement.

May I just add that this was more of a blatant and bold bid to hijack my client than one of actual moonlighting per-se.

[Dave A]

Probably worth pointing out that if anything, the onus on partners to conduct themselves ethically is generally considered higher than on employees.

[daveob]

Personally, I would go all out to get rid of her any way I could. Don't need ppl you can't trust around you. You'll end up spending more time and mind energy checking up on her than you will concentrating on all your important stuff.

Why not get an employment or partnership agreement drawn up, make sure you cover everything in extreme detail ( she'll get the message that you know ) and when it's time for signing, suggest that all the partners agree to back date it ( enough to cover the underhanded theft - yes, I would consider this theft, just as serious as stock theft ). Then point out that you know and demand her resignation. Time and effort doing the agreements is not wasted as you should have those in place anyway.

[CLIVE-TRIANGLE]

You have not really made it clear what the relationship between you and this person is. You have referred to an associate, and later a partner. Which is it?
Both relationships bring about fiduciary duties and this person on the face of it has no clue as to what it entails. I call people like this "morally bankrupt".

The issue of monitoring email or intercepting email at the workplace is nicely analyzed in the link below.

http://icsa.cs.up.ac.za/issa/2004/Proceedings/Full/078.pdf

[V4Victory]

Hello CLIVE-TRIANGLE - firstly, thank you very much for the link – incredibly interesting and helpful!
No formal documentation exists between the two us to date but the agreement of a partnership was verbally communicated. She has recently requested that this be dissolved.

Below are some extracts offered, using the link provided, on the INTERCEPTION OF E-MAIL:

“As yet, there are no reported court cases dealing directly with the intercepting and monitoring of emails at the workplace.

Companies have a need to ensure that its telecommunications resources are not abused by employees. If undesirable e-mails are sent on the company’s domain name it may send out a negative image about the company to the public. For example, a company may be associated with socially unacceptable behaviour or practices, which in turn, may have a negative impact on its client / customer relations. It is an entrenched legal principle that employers can reasonably expect from employees to act in a manner that will not adversely affect the employer.

At present there appears to be varying interpretations by our Courts on whether or not the interception of telephone calls breaches an employee’s Constitutional right to privacy. The position concerning e-mails is even less certain, although the enactment of RICA brought a measure of clarity.
It would be wise to keep in mind that, although the rights contained in the Bill of Rights are not absolute and may be limited under certain circumstances, the Constitution remains the supreme law of South Africa from which no other law is allowed to deviate. Section 6 of RICA still needs to pass Constitutional muster (probably judged at the hand of the section 36 limitation clause of the Constitution).
It is submitted that this is likely to happen, but even should the monitoring of e- mails in terms of section 6 be found to be unconstitutional, it must be kept in mind that our Courts retain the right to admit evidence obtained in an improper (eg. unconstitutional) manner. It is submitted that he likelihood of a Court accepting such evidence would be higher if the prescriptions of section 6 were followed in a scrupulous manner.
Whatever the likely future interpretation by our Courts of RICA and specifically section thereof, it is therefore submitted that all prudent employers adopt a relevant e-mail policy as suggested above at the workplace.”

[V4Victory]

I would like to thank each of the Members who participated in my discussions as well as for the constructive advice.
I will post a synopsis of the final outcome once this matter reaches its conclusion - for those interested.
Again, thank you all for your time!

[Just Gone]

Hopefully you have terminated your relationship with the lady in question. If she has only been with you a few months, how much damage will she cause if she is around any longer !!

[Brayn]

I think the security systems with a proper monitoring is the best way to reduce the unfair business practice.Because when you monitor the people they mostly reduce that things because you have proof than to file against them.And it also help to increase the security of your business place.