Being requested to return to the (non covid safe) work premises.

[Lappy214]

I understood that the current guidelines were to work from home if you could.
I can and so can all of my work colleagues including our manager an ultimate boss. There has been no drop off in productivity however our manager has tried her absolute best to make mountains out of molehills whenever the opportunity has arisen. We did have a rota with just one person being in the office at any time but as one colleague really prefers to work from the offices instead of at home, they now do this all the time. This has been portrayed as them being a martyr for the sake of the office etc etc.

Since Boris announced the roadmap out of lockdown it seems to have been interpreted by the employer and manager as "Things are much better now so we should all be going back to working in the office"

I've been copied in on a string of e-mails over the past week with people notifying of their return to the office from various dates over the coming week.

I've just checked the company's online accessible office Covid policy and see that the rule of having only one person per office space was removed last Tuesday and safe distance is now set at 1m (not 1m plus mask or any other type of mitigation, just 1m). Surely this is a bit premature ? They did exactly the same thing at the end of lockdown 1.0, forcing us back into office space sharing well before the guidelines indicated that this was ok but it was decent weather then and I insisted on windows wide open all day long as we can't maintain 2m social distancing at all times and share some essential equipment. Lockdown 2.0 was totally ignored despite us being in a high Tier area.

A colleague sort of forced them into taking lockdown 3.0 seriously by documenting and sharing his concerns but it wasn't actually instigated by our employer, just kind of reacted to in an "ok then" way followed by an official e-mail, describing it as a precautionary measure but in no way acknowledging that it was as per the "Stay home if you can" Covid guidelines.

I just think that encouraging staff to mix in the office is not sensible. If all employers do this, especially with kids returning to school from 8th March and the weather improving so people are congregating outdoors more, covid case numbers could start to rise nationally and our longed for release from lockdown type measures could be pushed further back.

I received and e-mail on Friday asking me to be available for a phone call tomorrow morning with my manager (the boss was copied in) and am fairly certain it will be to ask me to return to the offices like my colleagues seem to be willing to do.

I knew that road map would inspire over confidence and potentially lead to this. I'm pissed off that myself and another colleague will be painted as "non team players" in this matter when what we actually want to do is just stick to the lockdown rules so that we can ALL benefit from getting out of lockdown restrictions nationally as soon as is sensible.

Any suggestions for how to tackle the matter professionally ? It's a small workplace, with no H.R. and the ultimate boss can be quite petulant if they think you've come out on top in any way.

There has been no drop off in productivity however our manager has tried her absolute best to make mountains out of molehills whenever the opportunity has arisen
To be fair, they are more apt to decide whether productivity has been satisfactory.

There isn't much you can do but challenge if they don't meet the legal requirements. Otherwise, they can ask people to return to the office.

@dontdisturbmenow

Fortunately the manager delegates collation of the data to one of the staff and circulates the resulting reports as a motivational tool/stick to beat people with so I know that targets are actually being exceeded. Additional levels of red tape caused by Covid have just resulted in staff doing it on top of their existing workloads. We've sucked up plenty of stuff as part of the "we're all in this together pandemic spirit"

I'm so disappointed that they want to go against government guidance for no discernible reason. It's employees' health they potentially are risking and increasing opportunities for the virus to spread with potential knock on effect on the NHS. We are situated next door to an identical workplace (although their offices are much bigger and more modern, it's what we all do at work that is identical ) and they are restricting the number of employees in at any time to an absolute minimum.

How set in stone are the legal requirements ? It seems dodgy that they can just decide to change the 2m to 1m (with no masks or screens) to suit how closely we have to work in our office space and present it as "the office covid policy" so come back to the offices everybody. They're effectively asking us all to increase the transmission risk which doesn't just risk the employees contracting covid, but their families too. There's employees with kids going back to school soon, employees whose partners/spouses are key workers, all sorts of infection sources effectively being shared because someone has decided that we must be back in the office even though it's not necessary

Oooh, another Covid-related e-mail ! Everyone is now responsible for sanitising their own workstation twice daily (before they start work and before they go home, so not in work time obviously). No mention of the shared areas/equipment. Weekly cleaning service to recommence "now that we're back at the office." but we must all be out of the offices whilst the cleaner comes in, so there is no contact with her.

Phone call postponed until tomorrow now but must go ahead so I'm to cancel other stuff to fit it in. It'll either give me time to calm down or get more pissed off, not sure which.

Given the level of socialising that went on around the UK this weekend, even if it was outdoors, I can see freedom day in June slipping away from us.

Which country are you in, England?