lozgti1

Sorry but my sympathy has gone out the window.

Why isn't everyone back at work?

Tidgy

cos i got made redundant,,,,,,,,

lozgti1

lol. Sorry mate. Apologise for that. Lot of it to come too

Tidgy

nah i think there is alot fleacing it tbh, alot of companies are using it as an excuse as well.

TBH when things like flights start up again i suspect things will pick up rapidly, construction sector is already showing signs of recovering, im seeing 50 roles available instead of 2 or 3, shame none of them are viable for me

IdonthaveaScooby

Cos we're a rich country lol

Puff The Magic Wagon!

iTrader: (2)

I'm furloughed at the moment. Our company put us down to 4 days/75% wages at start of Covid due to loss of sales and expected sales that we needed. Someone fecked up the numbers and 2 months later they had to make 20 people redundant and put 10 of us on furlough in order to take advantage of the Government scheme. One of these was me and whilst my company is ensuring I still get my full (75%) wages, HMRC is paying a good chunk of them, so I'm not losing out further. Yes, they are taking advantage of the scheme but without it, then more people (likely including me) would have to be made redundant.
Going forward there's a good chance my role won't last past Christmas, so I'm busting a gut to set up a new line of income just in case but hope I'm proved wrong.

hedgecutter

iTrader: (5)

Because I broke my back in 4 places, and dislocated my neck.
Should I crawl back?

lozgti1

Think that might not be covid19 related......

BMWhere?

I've been working the whole time. Many people here have been in 100% home office during the peak, but now most are back 100% or at most 40% home office. Was a little quiet for a while but mostly back to normal now, although summer holidays means its still a little quiet compared to normal.

My company voluntarily decided to shut down for two weeks in April and everyone had to take holidays or use their flexy-time. My project was deemed business critical though, so I was asked to continue working - was a weird two weeks with only four of us working in my building and around 10 in the neighbouring building!

Home office doesn't really work for me as I don't have a suitable space to work at home and I need regular access to hardware in our labs that can't be accessed remotely. So for me, I've been at work the whole time!

I'm also luckily in a company that has seen growth throughout the crisis although our growth has been slowed somewhat. Germany has a similar scheme to the furlough scheme in the UK called Kurzarbeit (short-work) which has always been available. It's actually a more flexible scheme because it allows people to work reduced hours with the company paying the wages for the hours worked and the government making up the rest to 60% (70% since Corona) and many companies also add a top-up after that up to around 80%. Many people in the Auto supply industry were already on Kurzarbeit before Corona struck. One of my neighbours runs a small vehicle parts company (precision engineering) and most of his employees have been on Kurzarbeit since December and he's also shut the company down for the last two weeks due to lack of work. He's really quite worried at the moment that the company won't survive!

Every sympathy to those who have lost their jobs or who are working for companies struggling to survive. Tourism and retail industries are particularly hard hit and are unlikely to recover any time soon. Hospitality is also really struggling, but hopefully can recover more quickly! I'm sure most people would be working if they could, but the way we work in future may never be quite the same. Home office is likely to be a regular option for many people into the future and business travel will probably never be as common as it was before Covid! People have found new ways to work around the Covid crisis with more video calls instead of travelling for meetings!

lozgti1

It's all a bit concerning out there

Dr Hu

Yes - was furloughed for 3 months on 80% pay doing **** all (which was great, hahaha, mostly helped by the weather! Thanks Rishi!) - but been back about a month now full time, although our company used the excuse whilst we were off to have a swingeing round of redundancies, so were are now short staffed!
Most staff think it played right into their hands.... they were looking at numbers before, it just gave them the perfect excuse/reason to go even further.

mrtheedge2u2

I am working from home at this moment and don't plan on going back till new year. Luckily, as long as I have a computer and good internet access then I can perform my job from anywhere in the world.

COVID19 has proven that many jobs can easily be done remotely and maintain high levels of performance. If anything my performance has increased since working from home.

BMWhere?

The general consensus is that productivity has increased with home office! What is not clear is if that productivity boost is just related to working from home or also partly due to people working harder in times of crisis!

One thing for sure though, is that many companies were previously reluctant to allow people to work from home and have Covid has forced their hand somewhat. Now they see it as a positive thing and want to keep it!

Before Corona, we were using Windows 7, Office 2010, outdated conferencing and collaboration tools and we weren't allowed to use webcams. Now we have Windows 10, Office 365, Teams and webcams are now permitted! It's amazing how Covid and enabled the previously impossible!

lozgti1

What will happen to the plush offices and their landlords? Think a few will go bust...Intu?!

BMWhere?

Yep! More home office means that companies can reduce office space and use hot-desking, saving a fortune on rental and overheads.

Shane

iTrader: (6)

I'm working from home 95% of the time with the odd day in the office if needed or if nothing else, a change of scenery. We usually have 1700 people on site but we're probably running at 10% of that at the moment, the majority of those are in our manufacturing and test facility as they need to be in the office with everyone else working from home. My desk no longer exists with a "collaborative working area" in its place and I've been offered a desk and chair to use at home, only issue is I don't have room for it and I'm currently sat at the dining room table.

At this rate my need for a diesel for the daily 90 mile commute will be out of the window and I can replace it with something a little less frugal and a bit more fun, still can't justify making the Scoob the daily run around though.

Puff The Magic Wagon!

iTrader: (2)

On the upside, we're a startup based in 5 countries (Europe/US), so we already had distributed working and a reasonable WFH policy. We were all sent home 2 weeks prior to UK Gov starting lockdown and like many companies, the bosses discovered productivity actually went up. After a consultation they've decided that going forward we will continue to be a distributed workforce, where the expectation is WFH (though not your "place of work" to avoid too much travel costs!) and as such have reduced the size of the office by over 75% - fortunate for us as it was a WeWorks, not so good for them. What this means practically for me is that I will now WFH in Wales and visit the office in London maybe for one or two days a month - far better than having to commute 4 or 5 days a week from SE London.

Obviously once I'm back at work again, though they've shown no signs of taking me back part-time as they're now allowed to - more time to finish my barn conversion holiday let...

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

Convert to cheap social housing


It has to be said though I often wondered why so many companies feel the need to base their HQ in a plush rented office in the middle of London. London rent, London overheads, London wages, relocation packages for head hunted employees etc.

In particular the charities and public sector operations that are based there.

Consider we have people commuting more than several hours by car or train and even air from increasingly further reaches of the country just to get to a job in the so-called ‘city’, there has to be a heavy cost in doing that, both to employee, employer and the wider economy as a loss in productivity to logistic companies because commuters are clogging up road and rail networks...just think how quick and efficient goods to and from europe (pre-Brexit ) could be transported if the M25 or west coast mainline wasn’t perpetually clogged with long distance commuters.

In the end of the day if you are sat at a computer at the same desk 9-5 everyday and not client/customer facing. There is all probability everything you do can be done at home with good internet. Which is why it’s imperative that the UKs telecoms infrastructure is sorted out. Openreach needs better incentive to sort it out, but without real competition and under private ownership there is little incentive for them to go beyond the basics in areas where there is no money to be made.

Wurzel

iTrader: (1)

Been working from home through the whole thing with the odd trip to the office if anything needs doing in our datacentre. Our CEO said they will re-evaluate the return to office on 31st October but can't see it happeneing as they also said they are seeing a massive amount of cost saving already.

I am wondering though what the legalities of making your employees work from home all the time. Bearing in mind I am now using my electricity, broadband, tea, water and loo roll during my working day with no talk of reimbursement.

johno01

I was quite lucky as I’m a gas engineer for the council and all the servicing stopped so we just had to keep fixing boilers during the height of the pandemic. My days went from 5 days a week to once or twice a week for about 2 months. There was no need for 18 gas engineers to be in when there was hardly any work (weather was lovely when lockdown first happened) so wages stayed the same just came in once or twice a week to fix boilers.. Other local gas companies had there engineers in sitting around doing absolutely nothing, there engineers weren’t happy but at least they still had a job (sometimes people are deluded in there thinking considering all the redundancies etc..) I know many people (friends and family) who have felt the pinch so although it’s not my responsibility or problem I have tried to help them with money but there just to proud to accept the help. I’ve secretly helped them by taking there kids with us when I’ve took my family out to a play area, pubs etc just to give them a break and put a smile of there kid’s faces when I know they have been going through a tough time...it’s not a nice time right now so I hope everyone who is struggling etc does catch a break and things pick up for them 👍👊✊🤝

lozgti1

May was cracking weather

But good luck over the next few months. I wish everyone well

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

Btw I am at work.

But boss has chemo-brain (if you have experienced this, you’ll know what I mean )

So things aren’t exactly organised atm. Just praying he doesn’t quote 5hours instead of 5 days to remove/fit the engine on a Bentley just to fix a broken vacuum hose.

lozgti1

lol

IdonthaveaScooby

It would be great to get an indian summer to match our amazing march spring , please

johno01

isn’t our summer over now?

IdonthaveaScooby

i might just go for second seiss installment

BMWhere?

If you're working from home in Germany, you can offset a **** load of your household costs on your tax return, including leccy, broadband, water, heating, mobile phone bills and cost of any hardware you buy.
For the loo roll and tea, you might have to stash them when you go into work

andy97

iTrader: (1)

Didn't they fade out about the same time as those pollution pipes- exhausts

andy97

iTrader: (1)

Regarding companies wanting expensive central office space. Its all to do with prestige, snobbery.

My wife's company had an option to take a city centre office or outer town business park. It was a no brainer, inner city was double the cost, less sq ft and virtually no parking.

Outer town space, parking, commute routes via bus and train. A view of the countryside ( just). They spent a chunk on plush meeting rooms, new office furniture and saved a packet on 15 yr lease

Puff The Magic Wagon!

iTrader: (2)

But a lot of it is also to do with where the work talent is and access to resources. People are prepared to commute into Central London but eBay, whose offices are in Richmond, struggle to fill good well paying roles due to location (I used to work for them in another office) but the office is very pretty by the river...