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From 19^th July 2021, the Government’s advice will no longer be for employees to work from home if they can, and significant numbers of employees are expected to return to their pre-Covid workplaces.

But what about employees who are reluctant to return to the workplace, despite many measures being put in place to ensure their safety? Employees wanting to continue to work from home are in effect making informal flexible working requests. Some employees, for example those with health problems, are more likely to have these requests granted. For healthy employees, who accept that the workplace has been made as safe as practical, but wish to continue to work from home for convenience reasons, employers may need to move the discussion to an instruction to return to the workplace. Employees could respond to this instruction by submitting a formal flexible working request, asking to work from home. How would this play out?

Employees’ perceptions and the feasibility of working from home have substantially changed over the last several months, but the law hasn’t. As before, employers can refuse to agree to flexible working on one of a number of business grounds. One of the potential grounds for refusing flexible working request is the burden of additional costs. Another is detrimental effect on the ability to meet customer demand. But the bar is set low for employers. It is not necessary to demonstrate extremely high and onerous costs; it is not necessary to demonstrate that the ability to meet customer demand would be detrimentally affected in a major way. Any quantifiable additional cost or detrimental impact gets the employer home. So employers are in fact well-placed to turn down requests for flexible working and (subject to any new Government guidance or the Covid situation deteriorating) to secure a return to the workplace of the majority of their employees.

We will continue to keep you updated on general employment law news and any news linked to the coronavirus pandemic via regular blogs and our YouTube channel. Click here for our YouTube channel and watch the latest videos on updates during the crisis.

Meanwhile, if you would like further information on any of the topics detailed in this blog please email advice@sherrardslaw.com or call the office on 01273 834120 to talk to a member of our team.