Coronavirus: working from home

  Last updated: 24/08/2020

With offices unlikely to fully reopen until January 2021, where you have the capability to work from home then you must continue to do so.

Many colleagues have embraced and enjoyed working from home, even if it’s meant making do with less than perfect conditions, but some people have struggled, for a variety of reasons.

We know we need to take all of this into account as we deliver this new approach, so we’ll be capturing even more feedback and learning along the way. 

If you have any concerns about continuing to work from home, it’s crucial that you talk to your line manager as soon as possible.

Please continue to ICT advice around accessing technology from home, and please remember to let ICT know of any equipment you have taken home with you.

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Improving your home-working experience

There are a number of ways to make working from home more comfortable and more productive, while ensuring you remain well-connected with colleagues. The following information provides advice about some improvements you can make and how the organisation can support you.

Staying connected

It’s only natural that some people are feeling more isolated and missing face-to-face, social interaction with other colleagues but returning to work in an office may not necessarily be the best solution to combat loneliness or social isolation, as only a limited number of colleagues are likely to be present in offices on a regular basis.

With the easing of many of the Government restrictions, colleagues now have more options when it comes to arranging socially distanced face-to-face meetings in public places, particularly in outdoor spaces.

Some teams have arranged these sort of meetings already, either in larger team groups or smaller get-togethers and it is a great opportunity for colleagues to remain connected.

Technology

If you don’t have the right equipment to do your job at home, or you think that extra software could help you work more productively, it’s essential that you first contact ICT to see if a solution can be found.

This might be alternative machines or headphones, an additional screen or a webcam to help you better connect with team members and other colleagues.

Being able to see and be seen by more people, for those that are comfortable with this, is a great way of staying connected.

More information about making an ICT hardware request can be found later in this update.

Seating, desks and DSE Assessments

To help us make more informed decisions about how we can help people improve their home-working setup, you will soon be asked to complete a new DSE compliance course on SkillGate.

You will be required to re-enrol on this course to ensure the training is completed based on your homeworking environment, rather than office-based working.

A new online assessment is currently being designed, and following a short trial, this will be issued to all colleagues.

To complete this new course, colleagues will need to log in to SkillGate.

If you do not have a comfortable chair to sit on while working from home, please consider visiting your office base to collect the chair you usually use.

If you are planning to visit an office, please speak to your line manager before contacting the relevant site manager to arrange an appropriate day and time to meet on site.

Details of our site managers can be on our Coronavirus advice page for colleagues.

Colleagues who are visiting offices should ensure that social distancing measures and lone working guidelines are followed at all times. It’s also important that people are mindful when parking at offices to ensure that a sensible amount of space is left between vehicles.

Following changes made on 1 August, people in the shielding category as identified by the Government, have been advised to carry on working from home if they can, but are able to go into work as long as the workplace is Coronavirus-secure.

We are looking into how we can support colleagues that don’t have a suitable desk space while working from home, and this support will be outlined in the longer-term working from home policy.

This support could be financial, with colleagues receiving an allowance that could contribute towards the cost of additional office equipment they may need, including seating if colleagues are unable to collect a chair from an office.

Space, suitability and productivity

If you simply do not have enough space to continue working comfortably and productively, and it is not feasible for additional office equipment to be added to your home working setup, it may be possible for you to return to work in an office. However, this will be subject to decisions about which offices need to reopen.

People in this situation may include somebody working in close proximity to other family members in a shared area (kitchen, lounge or dining room), somebody without an office or a spare room that can be used as an office or somebody in a crowded house without the space for a suitable home working area, particularly if sensitive information is being discussed.

All of these issues could have an impact on an individual’s health and wellbeing and the best short-term solution (between now and the New Year) may be for them to return to work from an office, either on a part-time basis or perhaps more regularly.

If you are in this situation and haven’t already discussed this with your line manager, please do so as soon as possible.

Help with additional costs

There have been a number of enquiries about the possibility of the organisation reimbursing colleagues for additional costs associated with working from home, such as increased utility bills or investment in office equipment.

This is also being considered as part of the working from home policy, so more clarity will be provided in due course.

Utility bills

If you are currently working from home as a result of the Coronavirus pandemic, you may be able to receive tax relief of £6 a week from the HMRC for some of the bills you pay.

You can only claim for things to do with your work, for example: business telephone calls or the extra cost of gas and electricity for your work area.

Things that are used for both private and business use, for example: rent or broadband access, cannot be claimed for.

For more information and to find out whether you can make a claim, you can visit: https://www.gov.uk/tax-relief-for-employees/working-at-home

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Our ICT systems

If you should have to work from home, please download this document for instructions on how to access work emails from your home/personal computer.

• Please note the only supported browsers for this are Internet Explorer, Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge Chronium.
• Change your passwords when prompted
• Passwords are limited to 42 days before expiring. A password older than 42 days will not grant access until you speak to IT Support Desk.
• It is also good practice to ensure you are resetting you work computer passwords promptly when advised to do so. This will ensure you will still be able to access your work laptop while working away from the office.

Resetting your password

• To reset your password, log in to any Longhurst Group computer and hit CTRL+ALT+DEL on your keyboard
• The fourth option in this menu is 'Change a password'. Select this and replace as required. Please ensure your new password meets the minimum requirement e.g. MyDog1995

If you have any questions about accessing emails from home or changing your password, please contact the ICT Support Team.

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Keeping information safe while working from home

Although so much is going on at the moment and the way we are working has changed significantly, it is more important than ever that we remain mindful of customer and colleague data.

Scammers, people who may be contacting you on the phone or online, will see this current situation as an opportunity to catch people out, so please take every precaution you can. If something doesn’t look or feel right, then it probably isn’t.

Here are some simple steps that you can take while working from home:

• Lock your computer when you are away from it. Information still needs to be kept confidential
• Do not send work-related information or other people's personal information to your own personal device.
• If you can, put your laptop away in a locked cupboard/cabinet when the house is empty.
• Minimise the volume of files and paper records that you are keeping at home.
• Where you have to have paper records, please lock them away or put them somewhere safe if at all possible.
• Bring all work equipment and documents into your home, and don’t leave them in your vehicle.
• Be mindful of very sensitive/confidential conversations that may need to be had and keep these private, especially if this involves someone’s current health circumstances.
• If you receive an email that you don’t trust, please flag it immediately with ICT to check. Do not respond to the sender until you know that it's safe.

It’s really important that we all understand the importance of data protection while working from home.

Additional guidelines are being created and will soon be launched on Our Workplace, but in the meantime, please remember:

• Information security continues to be a key priority for the Group. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and Data Protection Act help us understand the risk we face and provides measures for mitigating this risk.
• While working from home, some of those risks are heightened and it’s essential that all colleagues are aware of our duties under the GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018
• The Group has a Data Protection Policy which should be read and adhered to by all colleagues.

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ICT support for those working from home

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