To WFH while on holiday abroad so I don’t use up holiday entitlement?

[RaspberryFarfait]

We have already have a big holiday booked this year and DH also wants to spend a month in his home country with his parents during the summer holidays.

He doesn’t WFH, so will use all holiday entitlement, but I do. Colleague is also on leave for some of that time so I wouldn’t normally be able to be off as need to cover.

WIBU to not book holiday, travel over there and work as normal, without telling work. I only work part time and it’s certainly doable.

Only problem is will I be able to log in remotely from abroad? Has anyone done this?

Don’t want to ask work yet as they’ll cotton on!

You would need permission in my workplace as our IT system won't allow you to log on outside the UK normally. There can also be tax implications in some countries. That being said most people who ask get permission.

Weve recently had someone sacked for doing exactly this (working abroad without telling employer) so wouldn't risk doing that if it was me

Why on earth wouldn't you ask permission. IT integrity, insurance, tax jurisdictions all prevail.

It does indeed. My old company (Large employer) used to have lots of employees who worked remotely, then they got stung for tax in one european country when someone tried to claim something tax wise in that country, declared their UK earnings, and it all began to unravel. My company had to pay the equivalent of NI in that country as well as in the UK. All employees then had to be UK resident and, more importantly, do all of their work while in the UK.

This was about 8yrs ago - so it's been a known problem.

I can, but other aspects of our private organisation need dispensations from their lead government department - due to technical security / information security and contractual obligations with that dept that any working offshore would breach.

I think my place allows a certain amount if time wfh in another country, I think it is tax implications and also international employment rules that kick in after a certain amount of time, but I think they need to agree it.

They may well have alerts that flag up if someone logs in from outside the country. Tell them but don't use the words holiday. Just say your DH from X country needs to go home to see his older parents for a month and would it be ok for you to go with him and work remotely as usual from there. We'd allow that for a month.

You definitely can't do it without asking - IT will certainly be able to pick up where you're logged in from, and you could end up having your access blocked and facing a disciplinary on your return.

But by all means ask - the worst they can do is say no!

Why do you think your employees would have a problem with this? Would it make any difference to your job? Doesn’t sound like it, so just ask them.

Tell them but don’t call it a holiday.
say you need to stay with family in another country for a month for personal reasons. You will be able to work as normal, it’s the same as you having to stay with family in this country and you’re just making them aware. I would do this but be prepared for them to say no. There are tax implications.

Yes , lying to your employer - even by omission- always goes so wel

Check your company’s policies and speak to your line manager. Defo don’t just not tell them! What with different time zones, time stamps, security, etc, it would likely show up as anomalies and would get you in hot water (defo around trust, and not following procedures, at the very least). We allow this sort of thing all the time, a couple of weeks shouldn’t be an issue.

My employer is a global corporate and we’re not allowed to do this. We have offices in lots of countries except sanctioned ones but if you’re employed in the England, we can work from anywhere in the United Kingdom but if you travel to America for example, even though we have offices there, we’ve been told it’s a different sort of law, tax system, security and even the type of work that those in the UK are employed to do that won’t make it possible for us to work there and vice Versa. People can travel abroad for conferences or meetings but there’s some exception that a situation like that fits.
You need to speak to work and find out their policy on this sort of thing, not just expect to put your laptop on from any country.

Ps while a couple of weeks should be fine, agree that longer periods are generally a no-no due to tax implications, so again just talk to your employer and find out - then you can relax and enjoy not worry about consequences when you get back.

It depends on your employer. Some of my colleagues do this (..as do I) and it's absolutely fine. But it would have been frowned upon at my previous employer.

Don’t you need to have right to work in the destination country though?

Good question, I'll just park this link here......

www.remaininfrance.fr/remoteworking

You might run into strange tax liabilities if your company paying employees who are working from a different country.

I would be able to with my organisation but it think there might be rules around length of time in terms of not creating tax issues.
But I would actually have to work all day - I couldn't be vaguely logged on but actually on holiday.
Ask work.

Oh sorry. Should have read thread.

I did this and just used a VPN. Was totally fine.

Don’t you need to have right to work in the destination country though?

How would they know?

My work would allow this but it would depend on the type of work you do and the perceived cyber security threat from that country. Also there are data protection rules about where you can take peoples data outside of the EU.

I wouldn’t risk not telling them, but ask what the policy is re working abroad

The tax issues don’t necessarily relate to the employee but are risks to the employer if they are not paying the relevant payroll taxes in the jurisdiction in which the person is working, along with other legal obligations on business with staff in that country (such as workers comp). Where I am my employer won’t let us work from abroad (unless on an official work trip) for these sorts of reasons.

While unlikely for it to be an issue for one month, it might be and so we need permission from the head of the organisation (and it’s a huge organisation, you’d be unlikely to get the support to get this approval, even if the manager was ok with it). It’s just easier for them to be risk adverse, they’d point out that we have holiday entitlement and we need to use that.

We have specific systems in place to allow temporary working abroad. One of which includes a “bring your own device” policy as we are not allowed to take work equipment out of the country for security reasons.

If you were popping down to Cornwall or something I would say fair enough but I think you risk a disciplinary working from abroad without prior consent of your employer.