Some employees at one of Canada’s major telecommunications companies are out of a job after faking their workplace attendance.

Bell Canada’s parent company BCE Inc. said a handful of workers were found to be abusing the company’s attendance policy, which requires employees to be in the office three days a week.

“Following an internal review, BCE terminated employment in a small number of individual cases for clear violations of our code of conduct,” BCE said in a statement to the Toronto Sun.

“These cases involved deliberate and repeated falsification of workplace attendance, including entering the workplace to record attendance and then leaving the premises, also known as ‘swipe and go.’”

Attendance scam at offices across country

The workplace attendance scam occurred at offices across the country and the terminations didn’t involve any unionized employees, the company said.

BCE didn’t say how many workers lost their jobs.

“In each case, there was a thorough investigation and individuals were presented with clear evidence of their misconduct,” the company said.

“The majority of individuals admitted to deliberate and repeated falsification of workplace attendance.”

Punched in to use gym

The news of the firings was first reported by The Globe and Mail.

In one reported case, an employee would go to the office just to use the gym before leaving. Another saw a worker clock in shortly before midnight and again after midnight to appear as if they were on the job for two separate days.

Those workers who violated BCE’s employee code of conduct were terminated.

The firings come at a time when some companies and governments are increasing employee’s weekday office attendance in an effort to strengthen return-to-office protocols and slowly move away from hybrid work models following the COVID-19 pandemic.

Return-to-work and hybrid policies

In February, the federal government announced its intentions to have all executives work from the office at the beginning of May while public service employees will be required to show up for work four days a week beginning on July 6.

In Ontario, the province announced last August that, as part of a gradual transition period, all public employees would return to the office full time in January.

At the beginning of the year, the City of Toronto said all eligible employees are required to perform their duties a minimum of three days at their office location and the rest of the week at a remote work location, according to its remote work policy.

However, municipal division heads are expected to work a minimum of four days per week at their city work location.

The city stresses that work arrangements are flexible and reasonable depending on operational requirements.

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