Get back to the office! But why?

The entrenched behaviour of office life has been remarkably easy for me to shirk MissA Me too Chewbacca. I just wear much more casual clothes that I already had, and of course big savings in petrol.

They get more out of me, as I work a bit longer than agreed hours, especially if there is something I want to finish. There is no chatting apart from our whatsapp group or occasional phone calls.

The problem with “working from home” is that many people mustn’t be, ( working that is) or why are we still sat in telephone queues for hours and hours waiting for someone to pick up. ? 1 hour and 20 minutes Barclays today . 45 minutes my LA yesterday and then a message saying “ due to Covid 19 our agents are working from home ... blah blah blah please try later”

My son waited over 3 hours to speak to his insurance company last Friday.

If everyone was working as hard as they claim to be and production / output was up why is this ?

Peoples fear of change is quite palpable isnt it.

They can’t complain when people use their freedom to decide where to work. Cummings can’t direct everything especially individual choice.

With respect Whitewave, it's not really individual choice that's driving people working from home, as opposed to going into the office. Many offices are unable to accommodate all of their staff safely, following COVID safety guidelines information, and so have no choice but to ask them to remain at home for the time being. Some employers, like mine, are offering their staff a staged return, so that just 1 person in each department is working in the office on any one day. So it's not really "freedom to work where they want to", it's more a matter of "working where it's safe to do so."

MissAdventure

Why should people put themselves at risk for office work and making overpriced coffees and sandwiches, grandad?

A Distribution centre worker engaged in working unsocial work shifts does not get to see sandwiches and coffee unless that is brought from home previously prepared by that worker.

That persons bosses are the ones who requires those expensive coffees and sandwiches as they work from their remote very smart city-centre offices on regular daytime hours.

And it is those that are moaning about returning to that life and actually once again supporting those under their charge on those out of town industrial centre distribution sites.

Some eople are asking what will happen to all those who will not be needed (or nor as many of them) if pwople don't go back to working in offices.

They will go the same way as crossing sweepers did when horse traffic no longer covered road crossings with dung, lamplighters when they no longer needed to go round the street lamps with long poles, and roadside blacksmiths when there was no longer a roaring trade shoeing the horses of passing stagecoaches.

I've not noticed anyone insisting that we should have kept gas lamps and refused to use any transport that wasn't horse-powered.

Yes.
I'm reminded of working in a care home, when the residents were all invited down to the main lounge for a big Christmas dinner.

One of the carers cried, because she said her residents shouldn't have to go. (She had worked there for years, and it would mean a change to her routine)

It will not be up to the employees whether or not they continue working from home, it will be up to the employers. If the employers find that the work continues to be done as efficiently or even with greater efficiency with employees working from home then that is what will happen.
What matters to a business is its own profits. It will not care whether city centre buildings stand empty or whether sandwich shop employees lose their jobs.

If everyone was working as hard as they claim to be and production/output was up why is this ?

I don't know whether banks and local authorities were able to give every employee full access to the systems they would need, in order to do their jobs fully Gillybob? But, if they couldn't, that would mean that only a percentage of their staff would be able to be in the workplace at any one time, to allow for safe social distancing. So, out of a team of say 40 staff, if only 10 can be accommodated in their workplace, they can only take 25% of their usual rate of calls.

I will admit that if empty office blocks are converted to living accommodation my business will benefit.

Whether or not anyone watched the lunchtime news I don't know, but a family of illegal immigrants were being interviewed and all they receive is £35 a week---family of four. Husband can't look for work etc until paperwork is sorted but meanwhile he does voluntary work delivering food parcels to families.

No sign of a long face, happy children and mum. They'd probably give their eye teeth to be able to visit those coffee shops mentioned along with the sandwich shop. After seeing these families on the news I couldn't care less how many of those shops fold.

Does our way of life focus that much around overcharged coffee and sandwich shops ? These people were so happy and cheerful----with nothing ! Makes you think.

Why is everyone so hung up on coffee shops? There are very few independents in city centres, and the chains can easily relocate. It is likely that people will need (or want) to meet colleagues even if they are working from home, and coffee shops could provide venues for that to happen, as well as be places where local residents can go instead of shopping, if High Streets change their focus to become community hubs.

There's no such thing as an illegal immigrant. Just sayin......

According to the FT 100,000 cleaners are employed at Canary Wharf. If just half of those are made unemployed that still leaves an enormous amount of people claiming universal credit. Added to that, many of these cleaners will be working under the rada. They will be left with nothing
How will these people survive? I know what I think.

Everyone has the right to request flexible hours, even though it may not be feasible, but the last few months have shown that in a lot of cases, it can be more than accommodated.

EllanVannin If those immigrants were receiving any official money at all, they were not here illegally. If their presence were not legally sanctioned, they would be trying to find casual work paid for out the till, and keeping a very low profile if any government officials came by.

If empty offices could be converted into affordable housing it would keep the city centres alive, perhaps even more so, as people wouldn't need to commute to bars, theatres etc.
The trouble with that, AGAA4, is that those living in affordable housing might not be the ones who could afford theatre tickets and eating out in restaurants. Up until a year ago I was occasionally meeting my husband after work in London and spending nearly £300 of an evening on seeing a play and dining out. Most city centres couldn't flourish without the extravagant spending habits of their high earning inhabitants.
Also quite a lot of business transactions take place over long lunches or over after work drinks. It will be interesting to see what effect the lack of face to face contact has on the business world.

Surely people would still spend the same?
Working from home needn't stop people from going out - in fact, more might decide to, if they don't have to be up at 5am for a long commute.

There are a whole host of support workers to offices and shops that are being affected: office cleaners, water cooler companies, personal hygiene companies, window cleaners, office management companies, insurance companies, milk deliveries, outside catering, electricians, fire alarm engineers, air conditioning engineers, confidential office waste management, heating engineers.....
So for those who ^don't care about overpriced coffee shops and sandwich shops^; they are just the tip of the iceberg of people who's businesses, and employees livelihoods, depend on offices.

Just a thought, but nobody seemed particularly worried about town centres when they were being destroyed by out of town shopping complexes.

I don't see that it's any of the government's business to dictate to private enterprises where their employees should be working from.

I'm finding these responses very interesting because it was reported on twitter this morning that Yougov had run a poll on whether workers should return to their offices and it was the age 65+ respondents who were the most in favour. We're clearly bucking the trend on here

Chewbacca

^They can’t complain when people use their freedom to decide where to work. Cummings can’t^ direct everything especially individual choice.

With respect Whitewave, it's not really individual choice that's driving people working from home, as opposed to going into the office. Many offices are unable to accommodate all of their staff safely, following COVID safety guidelines information, and so have no choice but to ask them to remain at home for the time being. Some employers, like mine, are offering their staff a staged return, so that just 1 person in each department is working in the office on any one day. So it's not really "freedom to work where they want to", it's more a matter of "working where it's safe to do so."

Yes that’s true as well. But many of those able to choose will choose to continue working at home.

Both my two are revelling in the freedom to work where they like and when they like without interruption. Consequently everything is getting done much quicker and more efficiently.
Zoom is used for meetings. They are able to continue to monitor their projects and in one case continues to make site visits etc.

One of them sub contract work to consultants and it is noticeable that these people are entirely giving up their offices to work at home.

Change is coming.

Workers are happy to embrace it.

Threatening workers with headlines like the Telegraph won’t cut it.

Surely whether workers keep their jobs is entirely up to the employers. The government should butt out.

Let me give an example of the problems someone working from home can case to others.

In my post @17:05 I referred to a safety incident where a person working from home was responsible for. That incident involved the person working from home not informing a Loading dock supervisor that a yard vehicle shunter had reported in as sick.

Therefore no agency shunter was booked by the day shift dock supervisor and when no one turned up on the night shift to carry out the shunting the night supervisor decided he would have to do the work himself if any vehicles were to get loaded even though he had not been properly trained to do so.

While manoeuvring one forty foot refrigerated trailer onto the loading dock he collided with another parked trailer causing considerable damage to both vehicles.

The investigation into the incident found that the person working from home on that day had problems with the children, who were not at school, and had forgotten in all that to report the matter of the shunter being absent to the loading dock office.

As was concluded by the investigation, the trailer that was hit could just as easily been a person standing or walking in that yard.

So much for the efficiency of home working.

nobody seemed particularly worried about town centres when they were being destroyed by out of town shopping complexes.

I don't know whereabouts you live MaisieD but there was outrage and protests for months when our local council published plans for an out of town retail complex; for exactly the reasons that you describe. Nobody wanted it, stating that people's shopping preferences have changed so much and they'd prefer a cinema complex with places to eat out. We were ignored and got the retail complex instead. And it's now empty.

In addition Chewbacca we shouldn't forget the transport workers who serve office personnel. TfL is in big trouble because fares income has fallen by 90 per cent during covid. Londoners have done the right thing and stayed at home – so there simply isn’t enough money coming in to pay for the services. I forget the exact amount but they are several billion short. This could result in laying off many many staff.