What if an employee cannot work from home but is genuinely afraid of travelling / going into work – what options do I have?
There is less guidance in respect of whether an employee can refuse to go into the workplace as a result of health and safety concerns about their commute. An employer’s duties to ensure the health, safety and welfare of its employees only extend to the workplace or where an employee is acting in the course of their employment. This does not include the risks of travelling to and from work by public transport.
As there are various ways in which an employee can travel to work, it will be difficult for them to legitimately refuse to come to work due to their commute. Employers should discuss any concerns with the employee and seek to find an appropriate resolution. The government has published guidance on safer travel for passengers during the Covid-19 pandemic and employers should encourage flexibility as far as possible, such as allowing employees to travel at off-peak times and staggering workers’ hours.
Related FAQs
The Government has produced and published three new Procurement Policy Notes as a direct result of the ever changing Covid-19 environment.
PPN 01/20: Responding to COVID-19
The purpose of PPN 01/20 is to ensure that contracting authorities are able to procure goods, services and works with extreme urgency, to allow them to respond to the pandemic efficiently.
This PPN provides guidance for the following circumstances:
- Direct award due to extreme urgency (regulations 32(2)(c)) (click here to read our article regarding regulation 32)
- Direct award due to an absence of competition or protection of exclusive rights
- Call off from an existing framework agreement or dynamic purchasing system
- Call for competition using a standard procedure with accelerated timescales
- Extending or modifying a contract during its term
PPN 02/20: Supplier relief due to COVID-19
PPN 02/20 focuses predominantly on the supplier to assist in keeping supply chains open and ensuring that suppliers are kept financially sound during these unpredictable times.
This PPN provides guidance for the following circumstances:
- Urgent reviews of contract portfolios and to update suppliers if they believe they are at risk
- Put in place appropriate payment measure to support supplier cash flow
- Where contract payments are based on ‘payment by results’ make payments based on previous invoices
- Ask suppliers to act on a ‘open book’ basis and make cost data available to the contracting authority during this period
- Ensure invoices submitted by suppliers are paid immediately on receipt
PPN 03/20: Use of Procurement Cards
The third guidance note PPN 03/20 relates to the use of procurement cards to increase efficiency and accelerate payment to suppliers.
This PPN provides the following advice and urges organisations to arrange with their procurement card provider to:
- Increase a single transaction limit to £20,000 for key card holders
- Raise monthly limits on spending with procurement cards to £100,000 for key card holders
- Spend on procurement cards each month in excess of £100,000 should be permissible to meet business needs
Although the above advice has been provided, should these limits not be necessary, organisations should seek an appropriate transaction limit or monthly limit.
The PPN also advises that by 30 April 2020, in scope organisations should:
- Ensure that a number of appropriate staff have the authority to use these cards
- Open all relevant categories of spend to enable these cards to be used more widely
Charities can also take advantage of the existing measures the Government has already put in place including deferring their VAT bills, paying no business rates for their shops next year and furloughing staff where possible with the Government paying 80% of their wages under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme – see our People and Employment FAQ’s and our Premise and Property FAQ’s.
Whilst many employees may now have the resources and equipment to work from home, an employee may struggle to effectively work from home for a number of reasons. For example, an employee may not have a suitable working environment where they can work without being disturbed or alternatively, working from home for prolonged periods of time may be having a detrimental impact on the employee’s mental well-being.
In circumstances such as these, employers must carry out a careful assessment. Unfortunately, there is not any specific guidance as to when an individual cannot ‘reasonably’ work from home – it is likely that each case will be fact specific.
In relation to employees who are struggling with their mental well-being, employers owe their employees a duty of care. It is crucial that procedures are in place which will enable an employer to recognise the signs of stress as early as possible. In the circumstances, it may be appropriate to allow an employee to attend their place of work if this would help alleviate work-related stress or to prevent mental health issues.
- Audit
- Identify your off-payroll contractors
- Determine the status of off-payroll contractors
- CEST – HMRC employment status checker for tax purposes
- Communication – liaise with affected workforce
- Contracts – get them compliant
- Consider the Ward Hadaway toolkit
The Chancellor announced that employers will be given £2,000 to employ apprentices and £1,500 for apprentices over the age of 25 for each apprentice they hire from 1 August 2020 to 31 January 2021. These payments will be in addition to the existing £1,000 payment the Government already provide for new 16-18 year old apprentices.
He also announced that employers would be given £1,000 for taking on trainees in response to the traineeship scheme being extended.