Returning to office from remote working - conflicting government advice.

TBagpuss

As others have said, the government has only given guidelines, they are not rules and are not legally binding.

If the employer is taking the view that it is better from a business perspective for people to return to work in person, and assuming that the office is covid secure, then they are within their rights to start getting people back in. 

Its worth bearing in mind that even if she has been able to work successfully from home, that doesn't necessarily mean it makes sense for the business as a whole for her to do so, or that she is working *as* successfully as when she was in the office.


Her success may have required additional work from people still in the office, there may be morale issues caused by some people being able to WFH and others having to come in, which affect the over all functioning of the business  there may additional costs involved in having people WFH, there may be longer term issues with regard to effective management / training . There are also potential H&S issues - employers still have responsibilities when someone is WFH, and in normal times could expect to visit and do a risk assessment of the workspace etc.

My own experience, both with staff who are WFH, my own time WFH, and dealing with others in a personal and professional capacity is that mostly, people are not working as efficiently or effectively as they were when in the office. I am sure that there are exceptions (particularly among those who were WFH all along), and that it does depend on the type of work, but that's been my personal experience. 

Jeepers_Creepers

Thanks everyone, and MSH in particular.

Yes, anyone offering advice and replies on here has only one side of the situation to go by, and also has to assume that the person involved is providing the full facts. It's on that basis that I, too, have offered advice for others on here - it's not for me to speculate whether someone is fibbing or distorting the situation (unless there's very good hints as to that being the case...)

'Only guidelines'? That's the confusion - the chart from the return to work briefing paper would suggest it isn't - it would potentially be an 'offence'.

So, the situation actually is - even tho' all the government guidelines state categorically that you should continue to work from home if you are able to do so perfectly satisfactorily, they should still go back to the workplace if asked to do so by the manager - for that reason only? Gov guidelines don't impact on that at all?

So why were those who could work remotely sent home to do so when the lockdown was first imposed? What has changed? We are still officially in Tier 4 of a lockdown situation.

(This is not a bolshie person that is involved here, but one who has followed the lockdown rules religiously as they have an elderly person living with them, and to some personal cost too by not even visiting other nearby members of her family.)

Jeepers_Creepers

TELLIT01 said:

For many employers the simplest solution to those who are not being productive when working from home, is to get everybody working in the office.  It is also far easier to manage people when you see them on a day to day basis than when the only contact is via phone or video link.  Anybody can ask for flexible working but if it is declined there is little that can be done to force the employer's hand.

And that is likely the reasoning here - a blanket return to work.

Carrot007

Jeepers_Creepers said:

Thanks everyone, and MSH in particular.

Yes, anyone offering advice and replies on here has only one side of the situation to go by, and also has to assume that the person involved is providing the full facts. It's on that basis that I, too, have offered advice for others on here - it's not for me to speculate whether someone is fibbing or distorting the situation (unless there's very good hints as to that being the case...)

'Only guidelines'? That's the confusion - the chart from the return to work briefing paper would suggest it isn't - it would potentially be an 'offence'.

So, the situation actually is - even tho' all the government guidelines state categorically that you should continue to work from home if you are able to do so perfectly satisfactorily, they should still go back to the workplace if asked to do so by the manager - for that reason only? Gov guidelines don't impact on that at all?

So why were those who could work remotely sent home to do so when the lockdown was first imposed? What has changed? We are still officially in Tier 4 of a lockdown situation.

(This is not a bolshie person that is involved here, but one who has followed the lockdown rules religiously as they have an elderly person living with them, and to some personal cost too by not even visiting other nearby members of her family.)

Unlike most I'd say it was more than guidelines.

However I would also say it's always been up to the employer to decide and was a decision they can reverse for any reason at any time.

So always down to the employer to decide. And as others have hinted those who work considrably worse at home is a perfectly good reason to bring everyone back. (they would argue in the interest of fairness which as always is a cop out but allowed).

The onlt part of your OP that makes no sense is legal action. The action would be to declare the employee AWOL and follow internal procedure to get rid of them. This is not a legal action unless there is a very weird contract at play.

TELLIT01

Somebody previously mentioned additional workload for other and that's a fair point.  My wife has been working from home for exactly a year now, they started on 18th March 2020.  Although she can do the vast majority of her work from home without difficulty, she can't send out letters and other documents.  These are produced on the main office printers and packed and despatched by the few people who still work from the office.

Jeepers_Creepers

Fair points re potential additional work on others, but that is not the case here, and also hasn't been cited as such by the manager.

Anyhoo, thanks all - that's clarified matters, although the 'offence' part in the Gov's current 'return' doc remains a mystery.

Cheers.

TBagpuss

Jeepers_Creepers said:

Fair points re potential additional work on others, but that is not the case here, and also hasn't been cited as such by the manager.

Anyhoo, thanks all - that's clarified matters, although the 'offence' part in the Gov's current 'return' doc remains a mystery.

Cheers.

I think the confusion may be around the wording - a lot if the regulations have wordings that make it an offence to be out of your home without reasonable excuse - so potentially it could be an offence, but only if it were to be argued that you had no reasonable excuse to be out of your home (and going to work would typically be a reasonable excuse) 

Londoner_1

I'm also wfh but go into the empty offices 2 days a week, however im not looking forward to going back. 

Thrugelmir

Unfortunately what a employee believes to be a satisfactory way of working and that of the company are going to differ widely. As it's not about the the individual but the company as a whole.  "Me first attitude" isn't going to register well with Management when push comes to shove. Employers are going to know a lot more about their employees after the past year.