AIBU to think that all workplaces who can offer remote working should do so?

[Dooofle]

Why wait?

For example, my work could be done remotely if needed. We all have laptops that can be used at home if necessary but this is on a discretionary basis which they are not allowing at the moment. Instead they just send emails round warning that this might be needed if the situation gets worse.

Imo surely it's best that if any business can offer remote working then they do so as soon as possible? Not just hang around for a while to see?

I certainly wish mine would!

My company is preparing for working from home, I've volunteered to go in to the office anyway. I don't want to be isolated unless I have to be.

I agree. I sort of think they have a responsibility to. The more that's done now, the less likely it is that people who can't work from home will have to take time off and potentially lose out financially. My company is telling everyone to make sure they take their laptop home every night and as a company we're more than able to do all work from home from a technology point of view. But right now they're still telling people to come in.

My Dh’s workplace have gone the other way. He’s not due back in till Monday and has been told to take a few changes of clothes and underwear as they will go into lockdown and be kept on site for two weeks. He works in a power station so it’s pretty vital that they are staffed.

We are being told to take laptops home and they are stress testing the system.

In theory we have a great flexible working policy and can make our own choices but in reality as someone fairly senior I feel obliged to go in if others are. However from next week I am only going in on days where I have to.

I work in a job where people can work from home fairly easily so I think we should tbh. Take us out of circulation to help people who don't have the choice

I think its an absolute scandal if people are being made to go into a workplace if its not necessary.

My work (white collar) has really dicked us around on this. Keep sending messages out saying its "business as usual" and to follow the government's (useless) guidelines.

I'm going unilateral as of tomorrow and have told my boss I'm WFH unless I have to be there in person.

I appreciate I'm lucky even for this to be a theoretical option but I'm fucked if I'm going to expose myself to a life-threatening biohazard out of some bullshit sense of corporate machismo.

I work for a very modern tech company and we've closed both UK and US offices starting this week until April (when the situation will be reviewed).

On the other hand, my husband works for a company like @thepeopleversuswork, it's all stuff upper lip, and waiting for our Tory overlords to do what's best for the country.

I can't help but resent his employers.

I work in an NHS hospital and am not clinical. Have been told that it's tough and we are no more at risk of getting coronavirus than anyone else in the UK. I beg to differ mind. My job could easily be done from home, I work in projects.

Yes, I'm a manager and we're working on it. Logistics need a bit of sorting but plan to test it out next week and implement soon.

Yanbu.
My workplace (approx 40 people) seem to have their heads in the sand. One CV email last month and nothing since. Senior management team all petty much work from home anyway. Who cares about the boots on the ground .

I work for a large local authority and they are fully up to speed. We all have laptops with a VPN, and Teams is all set up and ready to go.

Honestly, they are not the best at many things but we are ready for home working.

My office hasn’t implemented this yet but I expect they may try to. I know that our remote servers couldn’t handle everyone working from home at the same time though (large organisation) so they may have to come up with a solution to that issue first.

My workplace has, remote working is recommended now to those that already have laptops/VPN access, to those that don’t, VPN access has been applied for, laptops ordered etc.

We took the decision today to switch to home working as of tomorrow. Small organisation so it wasn't too difficult to organise and definitely the right decision.

I have started working from home most of the time since a restructure put me in a London-based team. I just go up there every other week for a couple of days.

It's been life changing. I had no idea I found commuting so soul destroying. It's benefited the company as much as me in terms of my flexibility, commitment and output too.

If one good thing comes of this horrible virus I hope that companies realise the untapped employee engagement from giving their staff more freedom and flexibility.

puppymouse hear hear.

My DH's employer announced this week that their central London office will be closed for the foreseeable future to protect the health of the staff. Everyone there is all set up to work from home, and it's an organisation that doesn't have customers coming into the office or anything like that, so relatively pain free for them to close the office.

My employer offers flexible working, and some of us work from home part time anyway. They are currently making plans about how things could work if we had to shut the office for an amount of time. There would be some disruption for sure ( We are a charity and see vulnerable clients at our premises so that would be severely affected, also we get a lot of our income through the post so there could be problems if finance staff can't get in) but if necessary, as many of us as possible would be working from home.

DH has been told to be prepared to work from home with no notice. He needs to go to Germany to do a training course for a new contract but that's not going to be happening, now, as the course was cancelled. He can't be fully productive, wfh, as he often needs access to some specialist equipment. Also, if Ds2 is at home, it can be difficult to concentrate. We'd have to hope that this awful stormy weather eases off so we can go for walks in the woods and leave him in peace.

We've been told we can't WFH more than one day a week which is bloody stupid. There's no need for people to be in the office, we can do the job just as well from home. I think it's negligent of management not to be more flexible.

Where I work, we can easily do our jobs remotely and my workplace has already enforced a work-from-home policy.

I don't think it necessarily needs to be complete isolation. But removing just one of the opportunities for the infection to spread (work) would surely be beneficial.

These are businesses that have the full capacity for remote working, they wouldn't have to close their doors. But allowing employees the opportunity to work from home would surely reduce risk to said employees and therefore the business. It's not just the office but the commute as well, I work in a large city. I'm on a packed train and tram every day. If I could cut that out of my day there's probably a lot less chance of me catching the thing.

It's not just the office but the commute as well, I work in a large city. I'm on a packed train and tram every day. If I could cut that out of my day there's probably a lot less chance of me catching the thing.

Agreed. Plus if everyone who can work from home does so, the trains and buses won't be as busy, so everyone who does have to be on them won't be as packed together.