Like it or not, an employee may leave you and take their skills and experience elsewhere. They may be leaving to set up their own business, possibly in the same industry as you. It is not necessarily unlawful to do so, unless perhaps there is a stipulation in the employment contract forbidding someone from working in the same industry for a period of time (although, even if such a clause exists, you will need to demonstrate that it is reasonable to enforce it). What is likely to be unlawful, however, is if the individual steals from you in order to fund their enterprise.

As a precaution, we established discreet surveillance on his movements, both at lunchtimes and at the time he normally left. Initially, he was seen to travel home, and to pubs socially - no immediate cause for concern, although his residential address was seen to be different from that advised to his employers. One evening, however, he left later than usual, after 7.30 pm, and on this occasion travelled to another industrial park some 20 miles away; the site was gated and difficult to observe from a distance, our Investigator having pulled back to avoid suspicion. We were able to determine which building inside the complex he went to.

The site, however, was protected by a steel fence topped by razor wire and the subject building had blanked out windows making it impossible to establish what was happening inside. There were no business signs to assist although one of our researchers had by this time established that the subject's wife (not he himself) had recently put her name to a new company with a name symptomatic of the client's industry. Needing to know exactly what was going on inside the building, we turned to one of our younger detectives.

To have casually entered the building would probably have aroused suspicion and alerted the subject of our surveillance, therefore we needed to effect this in a way that would not arouse any suspicion on his part. One of the advantages of having a wide spread of Investigators with different backgrounds is being able to adapt people to different purposes - in this case creating the illusion of a fairly hapless, innocent, "lost" school teenager who would be above suspicion.

For practical assistance and consultation on this difficult issue contact us in the first instance either by email to info@answers.uk.com or by telephoning 01483 200999 and discussing the matter with our commercial team.