Let’s just say one slips through the cracks and you hire a drug user, what is the consequence? Usually the person who is using drugs either causes an accident or becomes one. Your compensation rate will rise and your company may even be put into a risk pool. This type of cost increase is unacceptable. The second thing that may occur is most of the other employees may find out before you can do anything about it and their morale falls. They begin to shy away from working with the drug user and therefore your production also falls. These rough times today with the economy being what it is an owner cannot afford to lose production which is eventually tied to less profit. The people on the shop or plant floor along with those in our offices are our money makers, without them we usually fall short of our expectation. 

 

Drug testing can very easily be taken care of by an outside source or testing company, therefore you should not worry about all the legal ramifications. Finding these types of companies are relatively simple, ask around, network with your friendly competitors, speak to the various associations like American General Contractors, ASA American Subcontractors or when all else fails go to the internet. Once you have found a company or two, by all means ask for recommendations of satisfied customers and dissatisfied ones. 

 

If you have not been drug testing and you would like to start, I would recommend starting with all new hires (pre-employment), once you are comfortable with the results, speak to an attorney about testing all of your employees. There is a website you may check www.dol.gov/elaws/drugfree/htm and there is great information you can get from this website.

 

Finally let me talk about cost; yes there will be a cost involved, initially the cost will be high but once you are all set up and ready to roll, the cost should be much lower. When considering cost, stop, think and analyze what an accident cost you and your company, also consider what a life costs and for that there is no cost, and you may be saving your business.