Grant is a delivery person for a courier company in Gauteng. He was the victim of a smashandgrab incident, where they stole his work phone from the vehicle. The phone was on the passenger seat in the locked vehicle. The company recently brought in a policy that employees are responsible for the replacement of company property that gets lost or stolen due to negligence. When Grant told his supervisor that the vehicle was locked, which was the same for a colleague who also had a cell phone stolen and was replaced by the company, the supervisor informed Grant that it is negligent to leave valuable property in clear sight and that his colleague had the cell phone in the cubbyhole.

Grant is not happy with the response and goes to the manager of the department and tells him that he is not happy with the way that the supervisor is handling the situation and the way he is being treated. The manager says that he notes Grants feelings but feels that the supervisor acted correctly. Grant disagrees and goes to the shop steward of his union to take the matter further. The shop steward agrees with Grant as the union was not happy when the company introduced this policy. They therefore decide to continue with the grievance. The shop steward and Grant complete a grievance form and submit it to the manager.

The following day, the shop steward, the manager and Grant have a meeting to discuss the matter but still ended up disagreeing about it They complete a second grievance from and submit it to the regional manager. The regional manager has a meeting with the unions regional representative to discuss the matter. During this meeting, there is still no resolution to the problem. At this

point, the companys director decides to lodge an investigation and sets up a committee to take charge of this. Neither the company nor the union backs down on their viewpoints and this forces them to declare a dispute and refer the matter to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration CCMA

Question marks

Describe the five steps to follow in order to handle this incident correctly.

Evaluate whether each of the steps described in your answer to Question was followed correctly.

Justify the evaluation made for each step in your answer to Question with information from the case study.