Feeling pitty for the owner of Shell Kiambu rd in a new world of social media. A photo showing a Vivo energy employee caught scamming a clients credit card data shared on facebook and twitter brought to an end a dealership he probably fought hard to establish. Vivo Energy, fresh from a confrontation with erc ERC after 4 of its stations were named in the petrokerosene scandal moved fast closed down the station and pulled down the shell branding. Am sure had a risk manager approached him before for a review of his business he would probably have named a fire or a major theft as the biggest risks to his enterprise . Where did he go wrong the experts in wazua. Employee vetting, close supervision or exactly how could he have saved his business.

Its very difficult to control these people when money is concerned.

Very true. I remember hiring someone by just observing the way they walked from the gate to the reception- the poise and steps were just right- and the person just turned to be the best! Crooks have the best papers, and you can never nab them using standard procedures.

Visited a Shell stn yest late at night to buy gas and they told me they do not have official receipts- Just returned the cylinder to them and i got my cash back. My intuition told me most likely the gas is back-street filled and the attendants sell it separately from the Station's stock.

For Shell, Igathe had to act seeing that his petrol stations were nabbed serving motorists with petrol laced kerosene. So for this Kiambu guy, he became a sacrificial lamb (or goat if you like) to shore up the corporate image of Shell.

I believe there is a difference between corruption and an employee malpractices. The owner at this point might not be aware of the employee behavior. Anyway it is a lesson to employers to be careful when recruiting.

To me that is the best you can do to protect the Brand. Otherwise the whole brand will sink and will sink with other dealers. Thus, it is a lesser evil.

@premio, I like the way your approach is from a risk mgt perspective. Risk has been evolving in tandem with the ever changing world. The dealer could not have foreseen this but a professional risk manager would. In the west, the CRO is becoming the 2nd most powerful guy in a company after the ceo.

In 2007, equity survived its worst run-on-the-bank scare through the sheer ingenuity of their ceo. A mlevi in machakos started a rumour telling people that the bank was collapsing. The news spread through word of mouth and soon the bank had to call police to control the crowd outside the local branch demanding to withdraw their cash.

Predictably, the branch ran out of cash making the rumour believable. Mwangi did two things; organised for cash to be delivered so that anyone who wants to be given their money is allowed to do so, and unleashed a PR strategy by using locals (kaos) to go and talk to people in town. By the following morning, the bank opened doors and guys realised it was a lie. The bank was there to stay.

Now replay the same scenario today with whatsapp. Within 30 minutes customers would be flooding all their branches. And yet only 20% of customer deposits are held in liquid cash.

@FRM2011 yes i remember the Equity scare was quite scarry. I beleive in as much as shell had its rights to protect its brand, the guy could have recourse if he hires a top notch lawyers to study what the dealership agreement provides as ground for Total termination. Risk management should now be over and above all other aspects of the business.

Two things.Whatever Vivo did to that guy was too punitive.But the guy was just unlucky,the event happened as Vivo were being accused of lacing their fuels so any business person(Vivo) would have done exactly that to control further damage to the brand.
In Kenya close supervision of staff is the way to go.If you leave your staff for long periods they will become creative.Its better you employ a manager pay him well with clear instructions on what to do.