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Is the age of working from home coming to an end?

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Written by Deke Adams – Business Development Manager. 

If going back to the office after the new year felt harsh, spare a thought for Amazon employees – many of whom are back in the office full-time after more than four years.

The Covid pandemic saw an overwhelming shift to working from home – and many are still there. Last autumn, according to the Office for National Statistics, more than a quarter of working adults in Great Britain were working from home at least part of the time. 

For a good while, the change was seen as a long-term shift, with home-based or hybrid working a permanent feature of the workplace. However, many organisations are now demanding a return to the office either full-time or for more days per week.

Tech firms are at the forefront of this change. In the US, Amazon told workers last September that from the beginning of this year (2025) they'd be required to go back to the office for five days a week, rather than the previous three. 

Even Lord Rose, former Chief Executive of M&S and until recently, chair of Asda has weighed in on the debate, coming down firmly on the side of an office or shop return, telling the BBC in January 2025: "We have regressed in this country in terms of working practices, productivity and in terms of the country's wellbeing, I think, by 20 years in the last four." 

Meanwhile, Salesforce, Dell, Apple, and Disney have all placed more restrictions on working from home. In the UK, Starling Bank has now mandated a minimum of ten days a month in the office, while BT recently ordered workers back into the office for three days a week. PwC, Santander, JD Sports, Boots, and Asda are also tightening up their policies. 

In many cases, these changes have not gone down well. 

Amazon, for example, met high-profile objections late last year that saw more than 500 staff lobbying CEO Matt Garman to reconsider.

Meanwhile, in the UK, many Starling Bank employees have quit over the new policy, with others threatening to do so. Staff at the Office for National Statistics (ONS), meanwhile, have threatened to strike in protest at being ordered to spend at least 40 per cent of their time in the office, and have been refusing to work overtime, out of hours, or out of grade. 

However, the momentum towards a return to office is increasing. According to KPMG, while in 2023 63 per cent of CEOs expected staff to be back in the office full-time within three years, that figure rose to 83 per cent last year.

There are mixed views as to whether allowing flexible or home working is good or bad for business.

Research last summer from Stanford University economists, for example, found that employees who worked from home for two days a week were just as productive as their fully office-based colleagues. Resignations were a third lower for the hybrid workers. 

However, other research has revealed downsides. University of Essex and University of Chicago economists, for example, have found that staff who work in a hybrid model are less likely to come up with innovative ideas than those who always worked in the office. 

The researchers recommend that companies allowing hybrid working should coordinate the days that workers are in the office to foster collaboration and innovation.

There are other things to consider, too, when ordering staff back to their desks.

If workers' employment contracts state the office as the normal place of work, employers are entitled to ask employees to return as a 'reasonable management request'.

However, if staff have been hired on a work-from-home or hybrid basis, or if contracts were altered to allow this, there's the risk of legal action if their terms and conditions are arbitrarily changed. 

And if home or hybrid working arrangements have been in place for a significant period of time, it might be arguable that this has now become standard 'through custom and practice'. 

Meanwhile, says Ben Willmott, head of public policy at the CIPD, employees may have other grounds to refuse. 

"Employers should recognise there are potential ethical and legal considerations for differentiating pay or benefits between those working from home and those working in the office unless these can be justified," he says. 

"For example, there could be a risk of indirect discrimination, as it’s likely that there will be more people with caring responsibilities, health conditions, or disabilities working more regularly from home. Treating groups of workers differently could also cause or exacerbate pay gaps."

Research from commercial property firm CBRE recently found that efforts to get staff back into the office are working, with the proportion of employees going to the office three or more days a week now at 43 per cent, up from 37 per cent in 2023.

"The general acceptance of hybrid working is widespread," says Head of Office Occupier Research, Europe, Richard Holberton, "but the challenge remains of matching employers’ expectations with that of their employees over the long-term."

While for many workers, such as transport drivers, health care professionals, and those across the direct service industry, there has never really been the option of working from home, for those who traditionally operated in an office environment, the discussion, and ultimately “rules” on where they’ll be located, continues to be a matter of controversy.  

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