Managers demanding admin team come back to the offce

[Peanutbutteryogurt]

Hoping for some advice here as need to send a reply email!

I work part time, two days a week at home and one day in the office to do printing and paperwork. This system has worked very well since April and as far as I knew was ongoing for the foreseeable future. We got an email from some manager who I have never met saying as of next shift everyone will be expected to work in the office, basically as we wear masks and if we socially distance it will be fine!

We have a small office, on any given day there could be up to 11 of us in the one office. We have some cardboard screens in-between some desks and we wear masks. It is impossible to distance at all times when we need to move around, put something in someone's tray etc. Managers are insisting the office is completely covid secure. It is quite clearly not.

Do I have any leg to stand on here? I desperately don't want to go in. I have stayed home to work today while I have an email back and forth with this manager and will go in tomorrow as my usual routine, but I am worried about next week.

As it happens, I work for the NHS in a hospital. We are literally just coming out of the peak of this wave and still have over 200 covid patients in the hospital.

Obviously some people have to go to work. The whole point of lockdown is to keep everyone who doesn't NEED to be out at home. This is not about jealousy over who gets to work from home and who doesn't.

Anyway, it was left yesterday with them basically saying if they let me stay at home then other people will want the same. As far as I am concerned that is a management issue and they would've been better off bringing people back on a case by case basis . Not willing to put my family's health at risk for the sake of making managements job easier.

I’m not sure if that was aimed at me or someone else - no jealousy on my part! I simply made the observation that there are many people required to work in a critical worker capacity who don’t have the benefit of the vaccine professionally.

Yes of course there are, but that doesn't mean people who don't need to be in the office should go in, just because others can work at home. The two things are completely separate.

Yes. I do understand that. However as a critical worker, surely you can equally understand that if the management of a Trust have reasonable and cogent reasons why it is business critical, you are needed “in the office”? I’m not sure why your argument about why you aren’t putting your own family at risks outweighs the interests of your colleagues if collectively you provide an essential service? And I do stand by the point that the reason nhs staff have been offered a vaccine as priority group (correctly!) is the service is critical to operate optimally. Just as it is critical for schools and other critical services for continue operating, but their workers do not benefit from a vaccine.

@Wingingit15

Yes. I do understand that. However as a critical worker, surely you can equally understand that if the management of a Trust have reasonable and cogent reasons why it is business critical, you are needed “in the office”? I’m not sure why your argument about why you aren’t putting your own family at risks outweighs the interests of your colleagues if collectively you provide an essential service? And I do stand by the point that the reason nhs staff have been offered a vaccine as priority group (correctly!) is the service is critical to operate optimally. Just as it is critical for schools and other critical services for continue operating, but their workers do not benefit from a vaccine.

Yes - plus what about other groups of people aren't as lucky to get the vaccination e.g. shop walkers, police, teachers.

If your managers want you to go back and you don't want to perhaps you should resign. But probably you'll go off sick with full pay.

If your managers want you to go back and you don't want to perhaps you should resign. But probably you'll go off sick with full pay.

What an odd thing to say. What makes you think that?

@BonnieDundee

If your managers want you to go back and you don't want to perhaps you should resign. But probably you'll go off sick with full pay.

What an odd thing to say. What makes you think that?

Because the OP seems adamant that she doesn't want to go back and the NHS offers 100% sick pay for 6 months and 50% for a further 6 months. Personally I think that's one of the reasons why the NHS has such high absences in comparison to the private sector.

That doesn't explain why a complete stranger (unless you know her) would assume she will go off sick.

@BonnieDundee

That doesn't explain why a complete stranger (unless you know her) would assume she will go off sick.

Maybe she will maybe she won't but we won't be told if she does. I have no idea who she is.

The government message is that everyone should work from home if they can
Many many employers are ignoring this advice because they want people in and for business to continue as usual. They’re claiming to be essential industries and making people come into the office even though they’re perfectly able to work from home. The government should have implemented stricter guidelines but that’s by the by. If your employer says you have to go in then you have to go in, end of.

The NHS as a huge employer itself should also take some responsibility for 1. protecting its employees and 2. protecting itself (as it is asking the public to!) by encouraging those who can work from home to do so. We all have a social responsibility to try to limit the spread of Covid as much as we can. NHS management is not exempt.

I think employee perception can differ

I worked from home the entire lockdown perfectly fine but I’m now ok because I can do more on site

So whilst I managed ok last time, now they want more than just managing

Ex NHS head of communications here.

Email your head of comms. Ask for clarification on what the internal comms message is for staff on covid/office attendance/redeployment.

They will know. They will also have daily contact with the executive team.

Most of all though, they won’t local press picking up a story about NHS admin staff being forced into the office unnecessary and will be able to apply appropriate pressure to the exec team to get this overturned if indeed there is no essential reason for you to be in.

Good luck OP. NHS management culture left me extremely mentally broken and I’m glad to be out.

I’d say working for the nhs is pretty essential !

It can be essential but still entirely possible to do from home.

Brilliant advice OrangeSamphire*.

What is your childcare arrangements for your toddler?

The NHS as a huge employer itself should also take some responsibility for 1. protecting its employees and 2. protecting itself (as it is asking the public to!) by encouraging those who can work from home to do so. We all have a social responsibility to try to limit the spread of Covid as much as we can. NHS management is not exempt

Thank you, this is exactly my point more eloquently put. I will go back when it's safe to do so.

I feel like I'm just repeating myself on this thread so I feel like giving up with it. I work very well from home. Better than in the office. I wear headphones and listen to dictations, home is quiet, the office is not.

I don't have a clue what other essential workers not get vaccinated has to do with my problem. This idea (that I only see on MN) that some people have it tougher so you should be grateful for anything and accept shit dumped on you by your employer with open arms in nonsense. No one lives like that in reality and if you do you should learn to stand up for yourself.

If your employer says you have to go in then you have to go in, end of

thankfully I don't live in nazi Germany! My part time low paid job is not worth the risk to my health or my family, who aren't vaccinated.

OrangeSamphire

Thank you, it is good to hear from those who have experience working in this environment.

@Peanutbutteryogurt

The NHS as a huge employer itself should also take some responsibility for 1. protecting its employees and 2. protecting itself (as it is asking the public to!) by encouraging those who can work from home to do so. We all have a social responsibility to try to limit the spread of Covid as much as we can. NHS management is not exempt

Thank you, this is exactly my point more eloquently put. I will go back when it's safe to do so.

I feel like I'm just repeating myself on this thread so I feel like giving up with it. I work very well from home. Better than in the office. I wear headphones and listen to dictations, home is quiet, the office is not.

I don't have a clue what other essential workers not get vaccinated has to do with my problem. This idea (that I only see on MN) that some people have it tougher so you should be grateful for anything and accept shit dumped on you by your employer with open arms in nonsense. No one lives like that in reality and if you do you should learn to stand up for yourself.

“I will go back when it's safe to do so.”

When do you anticipate that will be? It might never feel safe to you - it’s subjective. That’s not how employment works if your employer can show they’ve risk assessed appropriately. It goes back to my previous point of why your family
is more important than those of your colleagues. You work for the nhs, you’ve been given the vaccine for that very purpose. .

My toddler goes to nursery, but that can be unstable as any sign of minor illness they're sent home and there have been covid cases in the nursery. She had one in her group a few months ago and had to isolate for two weeks. There have been other cases but thankfully not in her group.

When do you anticipate that will be? It might never feel safe to you - it’s subjective. That’s not how employment works if your employer can show they’ve risk assessed appropriately. It goes back to my previous point of why your family
is more important than those of your colleagues. You work for the nhs, you’ve been given the vaccine for that very purpose

Late spring/summer. Numbers are going down but they're still not low, in a few months they'll be much lower, more people vaccinated etc. I will feel safer when the hospital isn't full of covid patients, when the consultants I work with aren't redeployed to covid wards etc

I never said my family is more important than those of my colleagues. If they want to fight to continue working from home they are welcome, that's their choice.

The vaccine doesn't stop you from passing it on, or at least hasn't been proven to. The vaccine protects me but not anyone I pass it on to if I am asymptomatic. I won't have my second jab until the end of march.

Although the research is promising, we cannot at this point say the vaccine reduces transmission. It is (or at least should be!) been made explicitly clear at the point of vaccination that being vaccinated should not change behaviour in any way and that it does not mean any restrictions can be relaxed at this point.

Terrible grammar there sorry

Yes it’s uncertain what extent transmission is eliminated. But even allowing uncertainty (not sure which jab you had OP and whether the promising data on transmission is yours) honestly you could probably just as easily find it coming through your home via a toddler at nursery given they often transmit on an asymptomatic basis.