The first step that an employee must take is to file a formal request for flexible working. This request must be made in writing and indicate what changes they want to make to their working arrangements and when they want them to come into effect. Employees should also explain what impact, if any, they think the change will have on their employer and how this could be addressed. The law states that the employer must consider this request in a reasonable manner.

The employer must inform the employee of his decision within three months of the request. If an employer is unable to comply with a request, they should meet with the employee to discuss this issue and the alternatives they may be able to accommodate. If the request is refused, the employee must be informed of the reasons why and, although this is not strictly a legal obligation, most employers provide a right of recourse.

“Employers will have a harder time rightly refusing requests for flexible work to work from home if their employees have already done so without interfering with their work and are able to prove it”

When it comes to dealing with demands for labor flexibility, the power is largely in favor of employers. They have eight business reasons why they can legitimately refuse a request for flexible work, such as a negative impact on the business or the absence of work for the employee when they want to work. As a result, the employer has a great deal of leeway in this situation. However, recent cases have shown that employers need to be careful when rejecting requests for flexible work.

Real estate agent Alice Thompson made headlines when she successfully sued her employer for refusing her flexible work request to leave work an hour early to pick up her daughter from nursery. An employment court awarded her £ 185,000 after finding that she had suffered indirect discrimination in connection with her claim. This is a perfect example of how employers, while being able to reject an application, cannot simply reject it out of hand. They need to consider it properly, and if they can’t meet a demand, they need to be willing to discuss other possible ways of working that would not negatively affect their business.

The employees who make up the millions of people who have worked successfully from home in the past 18 months will have a strong case for homeworking to continue if there has been little impact on service delivery or service. production. Employers will have a harder time rightly denying flexible work requests to work from home if their employees have already done so without interfering with their work and are able to prove it.

‘We are seeing more and more of our Housing Association clients receiving requests for flexible work and I would expect this to continue across the UK workforce in the months and years. future “

That being said, working from home has had a substantial impact on junior staff in all sectors. They were not exposed to the on-the-job learning that comes with sitting alongside senior managers. This is probably one of the reasons why employers demand a return to the office and feel that working from home cannot continue to the extent that it has been.

We are seeing more and more of our Housing Association clients receiving requests for flexible work and I would expect this to continue across the UK workforce in the months and years to come. With the pandemic showing employers that their employees can work effectively from home, attitudes toward the homework revolution are slowly changing. However, as the recent case of Alice Thompson shows, not all employers are ready to embrace the flexible working age.

Jane Bowen, Employment Lawyer, Devonshires