USA Working for firm and contracting off work to freelancer

[bronco common]

I heard someone worked for a big 4 accounting firm and basically contracted off all their work to a freelancer.

What does everyone think about this?

Which fields in accounting would this work in?

How can you get caught?

Would CPA license be revoked if caught?

 

[AGH the CPA]

so they are employed by a firm yet sub out all their work to a freelancer? Are they a W2 employee or a 1099 contractor? If a contractor I think there would be less of an issue. If an employee, they are not doing the work they were hired to do, no? So they could get fired but not sure how it might impact their license.

 

[kirby]

What does everyone think about this?

I think it's dishonest as the firm hired a certain person and not the freelancer. I would fire this idiot on the spot,

Which fields in accounting would this work in?

None

How can you get caught?

Don't know right off but consider that the freelancer has excellent blackmail on the idiot who does this. Anyway, trust me, this WILL get caught.

Would CPA license be revoked if caught?

CPA license involves a commitment to ethics, which would be violated here. I think it would be or at least should be revoked.

 

[bronco common]

@ AGH, yes they contract out the work they were hired to do by paying a freelancer.

I understand it's clearly unethical.

Assuming the person takes steps to ensure no possibility of blackmail, how can the person really get caught?

If he/she just gives all the tedious technical work to the freelancer and still oversees it so they're not just completely oblivious to the job, how can they get caught doing this?

 

[kirby]

First you prove how there is no possibility of blackmail, then I'll take a shot at how this will get caught.

 

[Fidget]

The situation of an employee contracting out their work seems a bit odd to me seeing as they'll be paid a salary for work they're getting somebody else to do, and therefore have to pay them for doing it, so there wouldn't be much left, if anything, of the salary they're being paid... so I'm not sure what they would stand to gain out of doing that.

But I suppose it depends on the contract. If it's a standard employment contract then it would be breach of contract to then get somebody else to do the work for you, and, of course, breach probably every ethics code around with passing somebody else's work off as your own, assuming employer doesn't know anything about it.

Yet... if they are a contractor themself, then depending on the terms of that, it is possible for them to then sub out work that's contracted to them, which does happen at times.

 

[bronco common]

@kirby Upwork is a site to hire freelancers, it doesn’t verify who you are so you can use a random name. In that case you can’t get blackmailed.. To be further cautious you could pay with a prepaid card so there’s no link to yourself.

@Fidget on upwork there are charted accountants in India that work for $5-$10 per hour so there is a lot of profit left so it would be worth it.