Pressured to return to office but cases rising locally. Where is their duty of care?

[Nutsoh]

Despite WFH successfully since last March we’ve been told over the past few weeks that our offices now have to be manned to 50% in a bid to transition back to full occupancy.

Some managers have turned the thumbscrews on their teams to —force— encourage part of their departments back, they’ve pushed the teams that have a lot of static equipment back in FT and allowed those with laptops the benefit of coming and going when they please with their laptops.

Despite the 2m rule we are allowed to sit in the office, anything up to 10 of us without masks, just needing to put masks on to walk around. There is a one way system but the kitchen is a free for all and you can go into the toilet right after someone else has just used it even though ventilation is poor.

So, I didnt have too much of an issue with this but cases are now rising locally and I feel it’s only a matter of time that it’s going to go through the office. We’ve all had at least one jab but I’m starting to feel a little anxious about someone getting it and it running through the whole building.

So, from a duty of care POV, if someone gets Covid through work and it leaves them seriously I’ll or with long Covid where does that leave the company legally seeing as they’ve more or less forced people back in despite the guidance still being to WFH if you can.

Can people take action against their company if this happens?

My employers have adopted a hybrid model now. Some people will always work at home. Some always in the office and all permutations in between based on both business/role need and personal choice. We’ve had some disaster areas with wfh, training for new starters in some areas being one but our tech function has performed brilliantly. It suits their work. People within the business accept there are differing roles and requirements and they accept the ones that come with the job they choose to do.

@wednesadaayaddams

”Well why are people like the OP so different that they can stamp their feet and demand to carry on working from home?”

How on earth does it affect you?! Some people take it very personally.

I’ve always worked in a mixture of places; home, office and clients’ homes. I have always been encouraged to choose my location and limit office time due to space. Do I deserve vitriol from people who are in jobs who cannot work at home?!

(Before anyone whines that I’m on MN during the day, so obviously a lazy shirker, I only very work part time.)

There’s a whole lot more to running the business than the OP holed up at home meeting her targets. So many on here don’t seem to understand that.

And there's far more to a business than where the OP is sat, when doing her work.

Having some teams in being called discrimination, if its based on performance would be very very difficult. Because not every team is the same. Loads of companies have certain teams that can work outside the office and ones that, it doesn't work for.

And yes, if its a poor business decision with no real reason, there is more she can do and more she can question. And also the more likely that the company, is infact, making a mistake.

Thats my point. You can say you are sure they will have done xyz, but actually you have no clue. So advising the OP 'well the boss says and they will have all the data, you just don't know enough about the company' isn't factual, or helpful.

You know nothing about the company, how it runs, what sort of targets or performance statistics they have or don't have or how they came to a decision.

The OP is unhappy and does have avenues available to her.

What I don’t get is why are so many people so opinionated about people going back into the office if they can work just as well and effectively from home?
Without sounding rude it comes across as feeling very miffed they had to go out to work when they felt unsafe doing so, consider home workers as having an easy ride.
Can’t think of another way so say - jealous in some messed up way.
You do actually realise people work, like actually do their hours working and very hard, not spending the day doing their nails and drinking tea?
Why else would you be so desperate for these people to go back to the office?!

[quote Haenow]@wednesadaayaddams

”Well why are people like the OP so different that they can stamp their feet and demand to carry on working from home?”

How on earth does it affect you?! Some people take it very personally.

I’ve always worked in a mixture of places; home, office and clients’ homes. I have always been encouraged to choose my location and limit office time due to space. Do I deserve vitriol from people who are in jobs who cannot work at home?!

(Before anyone whines that I’m on MN during the day, so obviously a lazy shirker, I only very work part time.)[/quote]
Not taking anything personally.

I don't care where anybody works.

But in the OPs case her employer wants staff to return to the workplace and the OP is resisting

The OP is unhappy and does have avenues available to her.

Yes

Ask to see policies and so on, which I don’t think will get her very far in the long run.

Leave.

I don’t think she has as much sway here as you think she does. That’s where we fundamentally disagree.

@TheKeatingFive

The OP is unhappy and does have avenues available to her.

Yes

Ask to see policies and so on, which I don’t think will get her very far in the long run.

Leave.

I don’t think she has as much sway here as you think she does. That’s where we fundamentally disagree.

^ This

This has nothing to do with flexible working requests. Anybody can and should be able to make a request to work flexibly. But it was never going to work for certain businesses to allow their whole workforce to stay at home forever off the back of a pandemic 🤷🏼‍♀️

But it does. Because the theory 'other people have had to go back/work outside the home during this/are at risk' is nothing to do with the OP, but is saying others have to so she should. It's the same with a flexible working request. You could have one granted and work completely different to someone doing the same job, I'm the same company. And that still would have no impact on who should work what or where.

Thats not how employment works, we don't all work the same.

Why would you have issue with someone working differently, to other people now. If you don't have an issue with flexible working requests?

Yes

Ask to see policies and so on, which I don’t think will get her very far in the long run.

Leave.

I don’t think she has as much sway here as you think she does. That’s where we fundamentally disagree.

I am not judging how much sway she has or doesn't have. I am just not writing her off and disagreeing that she can try and do something.

But is that really your answer? Don't try and get answers or reasons. Don't try legal avenues available. You don't like something at work, just leave, don't even try. Doesn't matter if it might make it better

Just up and leave?

DadAManger
What are you talking about here?

It's amazing that if you ask employees how successful wfh has been they will tell you great, you ask the bosses and the customers you get a different answer. Customer service both consumer and business to business has been pretty diabolical for the last year and a bit, at first it was completely understandable but not now, banks are the worst!

Sorry no sympathy here because we have worked throughout doing a mix of wfh and in office at first and Ive been in full time since February, dp since April

(Zero office covid cases btl)

But is that really your answer? Don't try and get answers or reasons. Don't try legal avenues available. You don't like something at work, just leave, don't even try.

I’m being pragmatic. If my contract says I work from an office, then yes I’d expect to return to that at some stage. Again, I don’t see that as a very controversial conclusion.

I’m being pragmatic. If my contract says I work from an office, then yes I’d expect to return to that at some stage. Again, I don’t see that as a very controversial conclusion.

Who said it was controversial. I just think it's incorrect.

This converstation started because you were positive that the company had a good business reasons to bring them back now.

Regardless of whether they do or don't, op still has options. And maybe if she even tries but, gets knocked back at least she tried. Or she will have a better understanding of why.

She knows leaving is an option. If that's what she wanted to do, she would just do that and not be posting this.

Sparklingbrook
Yes thank you, that’s what I meant.

"Work from home if you can." is still the official government advice and will remain so if the government have any sense as it reduces average daily contacts significantly, reduces cases, and helps protect everyone who can't work from home.

Any employer going against the official government advice is taking a liability risk in my opinion.

My brother was forced back to work recently. His town now has surge testing so the whole office all went and got tested. Three of them tested positive then, and three more a few days later. No one had any symptoms, but then some more of them caught it and some of them did get symptoms. One of them was so ill her mum called an ambulance but she was only in A&E. One of them is still in hospital. Now my brother has it. Would any of this have happened if their employer hasn't forced them back to work?

How many people in the community have got covid because this office was forced back to work? They all live with partners, housemates, children or parents. One of the guys who has it's wife is pregnant.

So much chaos and misery because their employer wanted them under his eye. (He's fully vaccinated. Nobody else in the office is.)

If I could do my job 100% from home then I'd probably want to carry on doing so (because I'd like to work from home) but having said that, it's a bit dramatic to not want to go back to the office when you'll only have about ten people there!
I work in a school surrounded by every Tom, Dick and Harry. Have worked the whole way through in school, like many others who didn't have the choice.
Unless you've cocooned yourself at home and not ventured out, you need to go back into work if that's what is being asked of you.

This converstation started because you were positive that the company had a good business reasons to bring them back now.

Nope. I said it was possible.

Regardless of whether they do or don't, op still has options. And maybe if she even tries but, gets knocked back at least she tried.

She can do what she wants. But she asked for comments on here and I gave my view.

@motogogo I think a lot of customers are being told covid or guessing covid when it's not as well
I've had people tell me our customer service is awful and they've probably gone off and said it's because of people WFH. It's not, it's because we are insanely busy

I suspect that there will be people taking legal action in the future if they were forced to go back into an office and become seriously ill as a result. It will be hard for employers to demonstrate that there were good business reasons if the business has done well even though employees have worked at home for over a year.

it will be hard for employers to demonstrate that there were good business reasons if the business has done well even though employees have worked at home for over a year.

It won’t, they’d just reference future growth strategies. Or the difference in customer expectations at the height versus coming out of a pandemic. Or holding it together short term versus long term. I could go on.

And no there won’t be any legal precedents set. Where would that end? Someone like OP wins a case despite being vaccinated, in an office of 10 people, and suddenly the floodgates are opened to everyone who worked as normal or close to since 2020, including everyone employed by the nhs or the department for education, with a much better case than the OP. Madness.

@TheKeatingFive you said something like 'op your bosses are clearly making a business case'

Which isn't the case. And it's not saying 'it's possible'

And Firstly, they are the ones with the data on productivity, financial projections, competitor analysis, and an understanding of where the business is going.

When you have no clue if this is forming part of the decision.

Which had been my point all along. Many businesses are not making this decision based on facts and figures or performance. They are making it based on nothing.

Which it's why the op can and should question it. It may only take a couple to out a good case forward and they either reduce the recall or decide a new plan.

But she asked for comments on here and I gave my view.

Yes and I disagreed and pointed the basis for your point was based on your own assumptions.

@Belladonna12

I suspect that there will be people taking legal action in the future if they were forced to go back into an office and become seriously ill as a result. It will be hard for employers to demonstrate that there were good business reasons if the business has done well even though employees have worked at home for over a year.

I guess you’ll have to prove that they caught Covid in the workplace, and not elsewhere, which could be difficult to prove. Even if someone else had gone down with covid, could you prove you caught it from them, and not the local supermarket?

Oh and you also said her employers 'won't be questioned'. When you know nothing of the sort and acting as though an employee can not ever raise a concern.