Do you have to make time if you WFH and internet goes?

We all either have a smart phone provided by work, or software on our personal phones (we can choose which we prefer) so most people can, if their internet goes down, use a phone as a temporary hotspot. If not, at the very least, they'd have access on their phone to email, Teams and most documents, so they'd be able to get some stuff done, if not everything.

However, we have a hybrid working model so most people do live within reasonable commuting distance of the office, and if they were likely to be without wifi for longer than a day they'd need to either a) agree some tasks with their boss that they could do without internet access, b) take annual leave or c) come into the office and work from there.

Obviously option A would be dependent on the kind of job you have or what you were working on. I would typically have some tasks to do that wouldn't require internet access - in fact, some of my work is actually easier to do without internet access, as no internet means fewer interruptions and notifications. But that wouldn't be the case for everyone.

I have had this happen twice in the last couple of months. The first time it was about an hour from the end of the day so I did what I could offline then finished half an hour early. The second time was a planned outage so I went to a library and worked there for the morning.

I once attended a meeting sitting in my car outside the library! Thankfully my laptop battery held out...

We're provided with a router that accesses by satellite. If that goes down we can be asked to go into the office in some circumstances. We're not expected to make any time up

If WFH it’s my responsibility to have reliable wifi. If short break (couple of hours) I would not make up - if longer would head to office nearby. Obs not everyone has that option.

It's a risk with any job that requires an internet connection, and it's something employers and employees shoulder equally. I WFH and whenever my fibre connection goes down, I switch it over to the 4G hub. The bandwidth is rubbish and it means I can't do my job fully, but I can still do smaller things until the issue(s) is fixed. I have fibre, so it's quite the change from almost a gigabit to 20MB down and less than a MB up. Luckily it doesn't go down that often.

I don't know what our policy is, but I usually download reading material to read later, so I would just switch to that. Plus much of my work is creating campaigns or writing presentation or content for our web site and I can do that without internet.

Harder to do if you work for public sector and aren't allowed to store things locally.

I use a hotspot, go to a friend's with my laptop or pay to work in one of those co-working hubs.

In my company it depends if it is becoming an issue. As a one off I wouldn’t be expected to give the time back. If it was a weekly thing it would then be something for me to sort.

I wouldn’t make the time up, just as I wouldn’t in the office. Even if you’re offline you can do work like to do lists, delete old outlook emails and saved files, call colleagues in the phone for catch ups etc.

We don’t have enough desks at work for everyone so I’m my situation I have to work from home some days anyway.

I have to go into the office.

As a one off for a short time, we wouldn't be expected to make up the time.

If it was a longer period of time, we would have been expected to speak to our manager and probably make the time up.

If it happens frequently, we would be asked to work from the office (having reliable broadband is part of wfh criteria).

Surely it depends if you still get your work done?
At a good company it should be more focused on output than clock watching.

If my internet dropped for a couple hours then I would work later to make it up if I needed but not if I’d got all my tasks I needed to do that day.

I pay £7 a month for a SIM that gets me unlimited calls and texts plus 20GB of data. That's been more than enough to cover the occasional outage.

No but if I'm having to travel somewhere for work and I wouldn't normally, I'd expect my employer to pay petrol costs. There is usual a £/mile rate stated in a contract for such events.

On the occasions I've had home WiFi or power problems I've used my own phone as a hotspot and if it's still down after half an hour I'll head in to the office. My boss isn't one who watches the clock so there wouldn't be an expectation to explicitly make up the time.

If there are lingering power problems in the office then we'd head home. I'd like to say I'd do the same if there were network problems as well but it's my job to fix those.

I wouldn't be expected to make the time up. I'd tether to my work phone anyway so it wouldn't be for long. If, for some reason, I couldn't tether then I'd just let my manager know until it was sorted.

I'm quite flexible so get flexibility when I need it.

My work is paperless, everything is on sharepoint so no internet means I can't access anything at all.

When the WiFi went down on the compulsory office day recently we all hotspotted off our work mobiles.

When it went down at home and looked like it wasn't going to come back I took half a days holiday.

Does your company have a policy on WFH? At my workplace we are expected to go into the office if we are likely to have extended internet outage. Most people have tasks that could be done offline for a couple of hours, but if we have meetings, it is expected that we sort ourselves out to join them - hotspot laptop from a mobile, join meeting on work mobile, go to office (or even go somewhere else that has wifi).

If I lost internet at home, I'd hotspot from my mobile because so much of my work is online. I'd tell people in meetings that I can't turn the camera on for bandwidth, but could mostly carry on as normal.

Is there an office available? My BIL's company got rid of their office and made everyone wfh. I'd say that they need to factor in potential internet issues when they make a decision like that, and that should come into any discussions around how firm they are about making up time.

For me, I can hotspot from my work phone, and if it was a longer issue they'd expect me to just go into the office. It wouldn't be reasonable for me to say I couldn't work because of internet issues.

What are you expected to do if the network failed in the office? Or are you 100% WFH?

Do you have option to go into an office?
If I didn’t have Internet at my house I’d just go in.
If it’s their IT down then I do other stuff at home eg sorting paperwork.

Is there nothing in your job you can do without WiFi? DH and I have very different jobs but we both have reading, sorting, off computer tasks we can do if we are not online.

What would happen if there was a lengthy power cut?

I increased my data package for my mobile and can create a hot-spot.

Failing that I could run into the office if it looked like it was down for a longer period.