Working from Home

Brie

@lisyloo
Not sure if it's the same for Jillanddy but we both seem to work for the same type of company (just sub "large private company" for me when J said "large public authority").  

And when there's all the blather about "we care" etc without backing it up it begins to grate.  We had a top director raving over a year back about how lovely it was to be able to WFH in his garden office and I thought WOW!  It just seemed so completely insensitive when I knew colleagues that would have thought a cupboard under the stairs would be luxury.  I expect that perhaps J's ire, like mine, gets directed at whomever is talking at the time if we can't have a go at the person that really annoys us - like my company director.

Yes you're right about freecycle being a good place to look - it's just that a year back there was very little available and the advice not to contact people at all.  In fact our local freecycle sites closed completely for several months to help keep people safe.  

fyi - I hate Lindedln but that's because for some reason I started receiving all sorts of !!!!!! messages on it!  Only solution was to stop using it completely as there was no way to stop certain people attempting to contact me.  I know others think it's great.

Sandtree

Jillanddy said:

Sandtree said:

The reality for most however is that working from home is cheaper than going into the office given how little it costs to run a laptop for 9 hours a day -v- saving on commuting etc

If only working from home only involved running a laptop for 9 hours a day....! Or that everyone's commute is more expensive than the combined additional costs of working from home. You have been watching the news about energy prices for, you know, stuff like heating a house for an additional 9 hours a day? Then there are those pesky things like having appropriate desks, chairs, etc., etc - oh and the space to put them. I can only begin to imagine the H&S claims that will start coming in for people who were made to work from home with inadequate DSE's. When someone works from home it doesn't suspend the employers responsibilities in all sorts of areas, even if there is a pandemic. Although most employers I come across seem to not have noticed that. Yet.

I've not been in my home since September, a window has been open since I left, heating obviously never been on and its currently still 16C according to our thermostat 

Not everyone has homes are money pits to heat but perhaps I should have said that for most it will be a net saving as there will always be some for which they cycle/walk to work, religiously only eat a sandwich from home etc and for whom there are less costs to offset against any energy increases.

As to desks, chairs etc, just because you are working from home doesnt absolve the employer from its duty of care to ensure you have an appropriate working environment. Both my clients I've had in the last two years have instructed people to do DSE assessments of their home environment and to contact the company if adjustments are required. I know several that have been provided with chairs, monitors etc as a result... indeed my boss left just before Xmas and there was a discussion on if they wanted the electronic rising desk back or not that the company had provided him due to back issues.

Having space for such things is a real problem but no expense payments from HMRC or your employer is going to add a new room to your home so that one is a bit moot when it comes to what payments should be due and if its cheaper or more expensive to work from home.

Obviously working in central London normally there are very few rich enough to work in walking or cycling distance from home and even those in fairly modest roles tend to have not insignificant commuting costs.

elsien

As an aside, my working from home risk assessment asked if my stairs were free from clutter. To which my reply was mind your own business. 
DSE, fair enough, some of the rest of it I just wasn’t going there. 

They also asked if we’d got fire extinguishers them when a colleague said no, are you paying  them, the answer (obviously) was no. Really don’t see the point in asking some of those questions in the first place. 

Savvy_Sue

elsien said:

As an aside, my working from home risk assessment asked if my stairs were free from clutter. To which my reply was mind your own business. 
DSE, fair enough, some of the rest of it I just wasn’t going there. 

They also asked if we’d got fire extinguishers them when a colleague said no, are you paying  them, the answer (obviously) was no. Really don’t see the point in asking some of those questions in the first place. 

  at the stairs. We weren't asked that, but our homeworking risk assessment asks if we have fire extinguishers, smoke alarms and first aid kits at home, but makes it clear work won't pay for them but does recommend them. 

I get to see the completed risk assessments. I am still trying to work out how someone using a laptop can have the top of the screen level with their eyes without having a separate keyboard. I've offered 'proper' chairs to anyone who doesn't have one at home, but mostly they are saying "no space". 

SharpShooter

Expenses should (in a common semse world) only be paid where there was no commuting expenses.

But most emplohers do not run on common sense.

Grumpy_chap

Sandtree said:

Expenses? That comes down to your employer's policy.

If you are mandated to work from home, rather than you choosing to, then you can apply to HMRC for tax relief which is a flat £6/week 
Claim tax relief for your job expenses: Working from home - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

BK1248 said:

Apologies, by expenses I mean the extra gas and electricity I'm using.

Yes I have to work from home, I am only permitted to go in if I have face to face client appointments, which is scheduled for once a week  

BK1248 said:

I've recently moved house, into my first mortgaged property. I lived with my parents previously.
Around about the same time, I started a new job and I have went from working in an office 9-5pm everyday, to working from home 4 days a week! 

I am not aware of many (any) employers that are paying staff WFH expenses.  There may be some but I suspect it is a small minority (or my awareness is far from the typical).

That likely means that the OP is limited to claiming the tax relief on the flat rate permitted.

I'd say that the absence of expenses is likely even more so the case for a new employee to a new job. 

In the past (pre-COVID) you would be offered a job and that job paid a salary and required attendance at a specific location.  The employer generally did not pay expenses for travelling to that location and the employee was expected to weigh that cost up as part of the assessment of whether the overall package worked or not.

In this case, the OP has been offered a job which pays a salary and that package requires attendance at the office once per week and WFH (heating, light, power) the remaining 4-days per week.  It seems reasonable that the employer would have expected the OP to have assessed this cost of WFH / 1-day commute as part of the assessment of the overall salary package and whether or not to accept the job.

The employer's case for WFH expenses to be contributed to by the employer would be far stronger where that was a change of circumstances from when the job was originally accepted.  Given the time-frame since the whole COVID WFH all began, I suspect that the likelihood of new changes creating new WFH claims is now substantially reducing.