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Taking Employees Off Furlough
Katy Cracknell • May 18, 2020
The Furlough scheme has been extended to resounding ‘hurrahs’ across the country. As we wait for further details on how the scheme will look after July, businesses are now starting to consider how they take employees off of Furlough and get them back into the workplace.
But how do employers work through the inevitable mountain of individual circumstances that will be presented by their employees and decide on who should come off Furlough at which stage?
As has been the case throughout the past 3 months there is no definitive answer to this question, instead employers should be working with their employees now to understand their own personal circumstances, the implications of a return to work and considering this when developing their wider return to work plan. We’d suggest as a starting point that business owners consider the following:
- How will you have to adjust your working space to ensure it adheres to the new guidelines and will that mean that you can’t have as many employees on site at a given time?
- Can you stagger your working day to allow employees flexibility on when they are present in the office whilst still meeting their contractual obligations?
- Are there any employees that will not be able to work from home in the future due to technical capability or not having a suitable space to work in?
- Are there any employees that would prefer to work from home in the future and are there some that are filled with dread at the thought of working from home?
- Have you got any employees that are shielding under the government guidelines?
- Do you have any employees who rely on public transport and are unable to get work using any other method?
- Do you have employees that are impacted by school and nursery closures?
- Do you have a bank of workers that use hot desking facilities and can these individuals work from home?
The list of considerations is endless and will be vary between each employee. What is likely is that some businesses will be faced with an employee who refuses to return to work (for whatever reason that may be) but, do remember that asking an employee to return to work is a reasonable instruction for an employer to give and that refusal from an employee to comply (without reason) could be a disciplinary offence. If you are faced with this situation we suggest you seek professional advice.
Employers are also likely to be faced with a flurry of flexible working requests
when they ask employees to return to work where these individuals have seen colleagues, friends and family performing their jobs from home. Employees have the right to apply for flexible working so make sure your flexible working policy is up to date
and that you have communicated this to employees.
Whatever your plans ensure you make the time to talk to your employees and understand what's really going on.
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