Theft by onsite manager..

We just fired onsite manager who has been taking cash from our tenants and not reporting on ledgers. The manager also took higher security deposits than reported on leases. What do we do to prevent it in the future other than reviewing all leases. It is against our policy to accept cash but some tenants pay cash anyway. Thanks for your help.

Ouch! That's an expensive lesson to learn. Review every lease, stick firmly to any no-cash policies you may have, and make sure you're screening your employees against criminal records - it can't predict first-time offenders, obviously, but if they've got a history of petty theft, you may want to reconsider hiring them!

our company prevents the problem a couple of ways. first, absolutly no cash payments and receipts must accompany all received with the resident's initials.
we don't accept rent payments in our property offices, just the intial hold and security deposits that accompany the application and/or lease.
we also hold our manager's responsible. if they say a certain amount was collected with an application but then can't produce it, it's their pocket.
we do heavily review leases and immediately address discrepancies.

You may want to have someone in Corporate survey a small sampling of residents to check the move in process from a customer service standpoint and at the same time confirm the amount of money they paid at move in. Posting No Cash Accepted signs and having regionals and inspectors specifically check to make sure signs are in place will help some, but sometimes the extra money is paid in separate checks or money orders.