To go abroad when working from home?

I asked our IT and they are fine with it. We can ask for our "location lock" to be removed. And they are fine with it as long as it's a normal "safe country". Like no Iran, Iraq, Syria etc

Why not do a trial run?

Book a few days' holiday. Go abroad, taking your laptop. Try logging in to your work system and see whether you succeed.

If you succeed but get asked about it when you return, say you had a sudden panic about an email or piece of work and wanted to check on it.

If there is a policy on logging in from abroad, I'm pretty sure you'd be told about it then.

Oh I hope this thread isn’t descending into another WFH/remote/felxible working = lazy and work shy debate.

Remote Working wasn’t invented in 2020. Plenty of people work on site, sat in their car, in a cafe or round at their work bestie’s for a bit of company, sometimes abroad (and making the most of the free time when we do, I certainly do) or with people in other time zones, and have done so for decades.

Everything that @MichaelandKirk describes above happens, yeah, it’s bloody shit, but it’s also been a feature of pretty much all large workplaces even in the 9-5 analogue days. Many of us can play that game and know folk that do.

We don’t need to say that @StreakOfTheWeek is a a slacker to suggest her plan might a bad idea - she could be her company’s top deliverer in her role for all we know. I think the constantly repeated advice to look at the policies, speak to her line manager would be the same.

It’s interesting how quickly any thoughts that working (in any capacity) whilst abroad on a tourist visa or traveling visa free continue to be studiously ignored….and there’s an assumption “it’s allowed” because a mate or friend has got away with it. The reality is it often isn’t allowed at all, or in very limited circumstances (e.g. restricted to checking work e-mails).

It’s also maybe worth being aware that working from home in some European countries is legally codified, in terms of facilities so for example in those countries the landlord or house owner might get their collar felt if the authorities find out a tenant or guest is WFH without the correct measures/precautions/declarations being in place.

I guess if I had to make one final contribution it’s that if I was a visiting Brit traveling as a tourist but planning to WFH in at least one of the countries listed by the OP I’d tell absolutely nobody what I planning to do or actually doing once I was there..

Our company are fine with this as long as it's not china, north Korea or Russia etc

Just ASK them.

My friend is a 'digital nomad' and combines work with house/pet sitting. So she's earning twice, while on clients' heating & lighting & broadband ...

It can work brilliantly.

But if they specify in the rules that you can't, don't.

And if they say no but you go ahead and do it - assume they will find out because of where your laptop is located etc and there will be consequences.

That's it really.

There are all sorts of ways of excusing why you werent at your 'desk'.

Put yourself on Do Not Disturb. Make an excuse as to why you couldnt respond quickly i.e you were working on 'something'.

Take your IPAD/phone everywhere and every so often respond. Say you need to look into it. The when it takes longer than expected say it was more complex than first thought of

Time emails to be sent at certain times

Come on line early - send a few emails. The go to the beach/back to bed. That way people know you are around.

What about the travelling time to the foreign country. Is that going to be taken as annual leave or as just part of your normal working hours.

The reason I am saying this I used to work for a very large company where these sorts of things did go on! I remember one lady who went abroad and did exactly what I have listed out. She claimed it was a family emergency but dont worry. She would still be working...I wasnt managing her but my colleague was. It took a ridicilous amount of time to resolve because she didnt actually say she was going anywhere. She claimed as it was a family emergency she thought it was OK to just go and carry on as normal without telling anyone.

Yeah right!!

I

She can't just not work at all because her outlook and teams etc will show her as not online and having not been online for days. She will need to be fully available and responding to colleagues, answering emails etc!

She can't just not work at all because her outlook and teams etc will show her as not online and having not been online for days. She will need to be fully available and responding to colleagues, answering emails etc!

Well that only works if your work also doesn't have any geo tracking in the laptop!

VPNs mask the location, they don't stop you being caught out.

I don’t think she is planning to have just a few short hours sightseeing on her ‘holiday’

So in other words you are planning to not tell your employers and seriously risk being sacked for gross misconduct! Please be aware that the jobs market is extremely tough right now and you would struggle big time to find alternative employment once sacked for gross misconduct! Is a a few short hours of barely seeing your destination each day really worth ruining your life for? You certainly won't be going on any real holidays for a long time.

Our IT systems don’t allow you to access them outside of UK which prevents this situation. However otherwise I would agree with it for a week or two if you are normally a home worker

Is it really worth the risk of getting there and being on a shared WiFi connection that may be a sacking offence if something goes wrong, or getting there and finding the internet strength is really poor or finding you can't log on to certain things because of being out of the country.

What sort of holiday would it really be? Forget staying out late and having a few drinks because you've got to be up and working by 8am, forget day trips and seeing very much of the destination at all because by the time you finish for the day and get out, it's late afternoon so you'll be limited to hanging out locally. As an avid traveller myself it just doesn't sound fun and I'd be sat worrying that I'm being scrutinized by bosses that will be wondering if I'm actually doing any work whilst sat in a holiday destination.

Keep the two separate in my opinion as it's a waste of flights and travel to barely see anywhere of where you are going.

Have you checked with work if this is allowed? If not, this discussion is moot

Fine if you ask and they say yes. Don’t just go without permission.

If the data belongs to EU or UK data subjects then GDPR applies no matter where the work is done!

You need to have the legal right to work in the country, regardless of whether you’re employer allows it

They’re really not comparable.

You just sound a bit jealous, to be honest.

Give an inch....

Might be at the UK end but what frequently gets forgotten is that there could well be tax and social charges due in the country where the worker is sat doing the work.

There’s much more to this than simply having an employer at the UK end that’s OK with the plan.

Seems to be a lot of skiving going on. Clearly people are going on holiday, logging on every so often and it thinking that perhaps the laptop will reveal where they really are.

It’s a bit like people working at home whilst also looking after young children.

Wouldn’t there be tax implications working in another country?