Hybrid Working – Here To Stay?
Monday 28th November 2022
Before the Covid-19 pandemic, hybrid working and working from home was not commonplace in most sectors. The need to adapt during lockdowns forced many employers to switch to full-time home working.
Pros and cons of home working
Many employers found that productivity levels for a lot of office-based roles could be easily maintained from home and employees enjoyed the flexibility and cost-savings of working from home. However, prolonged working from home caused issues of its own.
Working from home has numerous benefits, including providing employees with greater flexibility in relation to childcare or other responsibilities and removing the expense of commuting. It also often results in employees working longer hours, blurring the line between their home and work lives, feelings of isolation and a lack of human interaction. Hybrid working therefore presents a happy medium.
A permanent change?
While some employers may have operated a hybrid scheme previously, it has become widespread post-Covid as the majority of employers required employees to split their time between the office and home as workplaces reopened. This is because Covid-19 limitations on room occupancy levels meant it was impossible in the early days of reopening for all staff to attend the workplace at once.
In most cases the introduction of hybrid working was not a permanent change to workers’ contracts and did not give them the right to demand hybrid or remote working on a permanent basis. In reality, many employers have seen the benefit of hybrid working and have introduced hybrid working policies. A BBC survey recently reported that employees are now spending on average 1.5 days per week in the office compared with an average of 3.8 days pre-Covid which shows just how common hybrid working has become.
Employee requests
Hybrid working is popular with employees, many employees looking for new work are looking for employers to have a hybrid scheme. Employees are also more likely to exercise their right to submit a flexible working request post-covid. Under current law employees with 26 weeks’ service are eligible to submit one flexible working request every 12 months. Their requests could include altered hours, working from home or even term-time working. If an employee submits a flexible working request, it is for the employer to consider the request and whether the change can be accommodated. Since Covid-19 has shown that productivity levels can be maintained at home, employers will find it harder to use those concerns as justification for rejecting a request.
The Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Bill
The Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Bill is currently making its way through parliament. It had its second reading in the Commons on 28 October and is now at Committee stage. If passed, the Bill will make the right to make a flexible working request a day-one right for all employees and allow an employee to bring two requests in any year. Whether the Bill will make it into law remains to be seen but it does indicate that, since Covid-19 proved it was possible on a large scale, hybrid or flexible working has become an expectation for many.
