Aibu to thinking working on train shouldn’t count towards your contracted hours

[Daffodildainty]

I’ve noticed a couple of management colleagues recently working consistently short days then crediting 2-3 hours a day as working on train. Aibu to think this is bolocks, that you can’t concentrate properly or review papers during your commute and shouldn’t be working on highly confidential material in a public environment anyway?

If you don't think your colleagues are pulling their weight and it impacts on you take it up with your line manager.

YABVU. The beauty of modern technology is that I can remotely access my work files, have real time conversations with colleagues in the London/Geneva/Seattle/Singapore/Dallas, do the same work that I'd be doing at "a desk in the office", from basically anywhere: the train, whilst caring for a sick relative, or sat on a toilet seat! (not literally but you get the idea).

I used to drive a member of staff and a van full of work equipment an hour and a half each day and back again at night before my contracted hours started. Not my fault the company didn't employ someone where the work was. I used to bill them for overtime/include the driving in my contracted hours. Work was always done. I believe there was a class action taken out against a company on the continent who had a mobile workforce and didn't pay for time spent travelling between home and work sites. They stopped wanting to pay me in the end so I stopped working for them. My point being that if I am responsible for your liveried vehicle, your staff and your equipment, then I'm working and you should pay me.

Concentration and confidentiality are two entirely separate matters, and I'm not sure why you're conflating them, OP. I could more than concentrate on a train. But I would not be working with confidential material in that context. To answer your specific question in the thread title, though, YABVU, and I wonder why you are bothered about it.

Confidentiality is the main problem. If a stranger taking a surreptious screen shot of your documents or your electronic laptop/device screen from a seat behind you by leaning over or next to you can cause you a problem, then you shouldn't be working on a train.

All it takes is for that to be sent in to the Information Commissioner, uploaded on to the internet or sent to a commercially competitor and you have a major problem.

Some people do this kind of thing maliciously "to teach people a lesson". It happens more often than you think that travellers get caught out big time for stuff like this.

Why not? I certainly can concentrate just fine. I used to have a 3 hour commute to the office (6 hours total in a day). I would work 2 of those hours in the morning, get in by 9am and leave at 3:30-4pm. It feels like an awful waste of time to spend 6 hours stuck somewhere every day and not use it for something productive. I can only mumsnet and drink wine for so long and certainly not at 6am. It meant I got home by 7pm and could put my kids to bed.

If someone is on an hourly rate then IMO YANBU; if salaried then depends on the job. I have seen plenty of commercially sensitive documents through people spreading their laptops on the table- quite interesting if I was a competitor. Completely depends on what the work is, and whether it is appropriate to be done in public.

Lots of people's jobs involve travelling to meetings in different locations throughout the day- of course that travelling time counts as work.
You could insist that people work 9-5 in an office, but you then wouldn't be able to expect one minute outside of their contracted hours to be spent on work stuff. So no checking of emails or dealing with a client emergency or doing a last minute piece of work that would massively help you out.
Flexibility has to go both ways.
Insisting on office presence also reduces your ability to hire the best people, as they may not be willing to relocate close enough so the commute doesn't eat too much into their day and choose instead to work for someone who appreciates that lots of wotk can be done anywhere.
If deadlines aren't met, that's a separate issue really.

I bill for the majority of the time that I spend on client work irrespective of where I am. All my devices have privacy screens and a host of protection so I can work just about anywhere.

If the confidential information includes any personal data, then they probably can't do it on the train. That's under the new GDPR rules. There would be issues with them carrying a laptop, phone, tablet, etc with personal data. From my understanding, it has to be kept secured in a bag (ideally locked) while traveling, be encrypted (in case it's lost/stolen), and contain ONLY pertinent information that has been approved for such use. I'm not sure if a privacy screen is considered enough. It's worth asking whoever your GDPR compliance officer is (you have to have one). If their tasks don't contain personal data, then there's no issue with them working on the train

Your grasp of GDPR is quite off the mark.

Did Order it affect your work? Does it have any impact on you? Or are you just jealous as in your eyes they are working less hours?

Could you please tell me how it's off the mark? That's the impression I was getting from the training I had to take at work.

OP is what you mean is the consultants are consistently missing deadlines then that's something different to where they bill for work.

I'd be suspicious as I am with working from home. Checking your emails a couple of times is not the same as being at your desk.

As managers though it doesn't really matter how many hours they work. The are being paid for the responsibility and will be judged on the outcomes of their team.

I'd be suspicious as I am with working from home

DH has worked predominantly from home for 3 years now. He’s had 2 promotions in that time, consistently gets the top rating in his performance reviews and his annual bonuses (based on performance) are around £30k.
He does a lot more than just check his emails.

You have to be as thick as mince to believe that working from home just involves checking emails twice a day!

Employers allow it because it works. If they weren't getting full benefit, they'd soon object.

Is it any different from working from home. When my OH works from home I expect him to be paid whether it be at ours, his mum's or a hotel room. Don't see why a train would be different.

Depends on your boss and their opinion. Mine encourages me to consider my commute part of the working day.

My company is shit hot on gdpr and the only thing I’ve been told regarding mobile working is that laptop/tablet must be password protected (it is). Certainly no problem with carrying such devices in public transport, I couldn’t get to work otherwise. And no mention of locked bags.

I work on the train most days, gets as much done as if I was in an office

I work in a creative role - I do a LOT of thinking and planning about my work on the train. In fact I rarely get good ideas sitting at a desk and have attended several courses where they encourage us to do other things to get inspired. It works. Presenteeism is the bane of some offices. Work effectively and work well. Doesn't matter where it is.

YABU getting your work done is what's important not where you do it.

I do some freelance work, and I also sit on the beach with my laptop, using the free wif-fi which luckily extends that far. Or I might go and sit in the pub garden with a glass of wine and work while I watch the world go by. In winter I'll be in there by the log fire! It's faster broadband than at home.

If the confidential information includes any personal data, then they probably can't do it on the train. That's under the new GDPR rules. There would be issues with them carrying a laptop, phone, tablet, etc with personal data. From my understanding, it has to be kept secured in a bag (ideally locked) while traveling, be encrypted (in case it's lost/stolen), and contain ONLY pertinent information that has been approved for such use. I'm not sure if a privacy screen is considered enough. It's worth asking whoever your GDPR compliance officer is (you have to have one). If their tasks don't contain personal data, then there's no issue with them working on the train

Could you please tell me how it's off the mark? That's the impression I was getting from the training I had to take at work

A company doesn’t have to have a “GDPR Conpliance Officer”. Certain types of organisations have to have a designated Data Protection Officer.

If personal data is required to carry out a job, that doesn’t mean you can’t carry a laptop/mobile that contains that data with you. Otherwise, nobody would ever have a work mobile phone, or would have to delete all contacts regularly in-line with DPIAs.

GDPR doesn’t dictate that you have to keep work laptops/mobile in a locked bag. Securing IT equipment when not in use, and encrypting systems is not GDPR-specific. Accessing information in a secure manner while on the go is fine. However, companies are now more accountable for what happens if that data security is breached.

It’s not all that different to the Data Protection Acts (1988, 2003), but is focused more on the ways organisations get and manage data. It means companies are held more accountable for securely managing information, and gives significant fines for breaches due to lack of adherence.

Sitting on a train with a laptop wide open clearly showing personal or commercially data, has always been a no-no, but GDPR doesn’t really change where and when people access data for legitimate reasons.

If that was the case, everyone working on a laptop in an airport departure lounge could rapidly find themselves with a £17m fine.

Incidentally, this thread has made me wonder how my team view me, and if they realise how much work I do, despite not always being in the office.

I’m salaried, work well over my core hours each week (did about 75 hours last week), but I’m often working from places other than my office. Today, I was in the office from 9am to 8pm, and then logged on at home from 9pm to 10.30pm. My team saw me working from 9-5, because they work those hours. I don’t email them in the evening, if I can help it at all.

Tomorrow, I have a short doctors appointment at 10 so will work from home from 8 - 9.30am, then should arrive in the office before 11 and will probably finish between 8 and 10pm. Again, my team will only see me from 11-5 so I wonder if they think I have a short day?

(I’m quite senior and deliver a shitload of work- they must be very impressed if they think I’m doing that on 6-8 hour days )