Q. Should my employees be answering emails and calls outside of office hours?
A. In today’s ‘always on’ work culture it is increasingly common for staff to respond to work-related calls and emails outside of paid working hours.
Employers often see this behaviour as a sign of an employee’s commitment, with many even coming to expect this as a prerequisite for those looking to progress in the organisation.
However, you should consider if this behaviour is really necessary and understand the dangers it poses to your business.
Under the Working Time Regulations 1998, workers are limited to working an average of 48 hours a week over a 17-week period, unless they agree to signing an opt-out agreement.
This is designed to ensure employees receive the appropriate amount of rest in between shifts, which is hard to achieve if they are regularly required to answer work emails and phone calls during their free time.
You should therefore reduce the need for staff to participate in work-related activities during designated rest periods to ward against employee burnout and fatigue.
If you find that staff are regularly responding to work emails and calls at home, you should ask yourself ‘why?’
A common reason given by employees is that they have no choice but to act in this manner due to excessive workloads and increasing client demands.
To address this, you should ensure work is distributed evenly, thereby allowing staff to complete their work during paid working hours.
You should also explore the option of hiring more staff to deal with increased activity and ensure you are not asking too much of your existing employees.
There is also a danger that staff feel they have to act in this way to get ahead in the organisation.
To prevent this, you should look to address the existing company culture and refrain from glorifying those who participate in unpaid work as this often sets a precedent that other staff feel they have to follow.
Instead, managers should be alert to staff who regularly answer work emails or calls outside normal hours, and approach them to resolve the issue rather than turn a blind eye.
While there may be occasional instances where staff have to answer emails and calls outside of working hours, this should not be a common occurrence.
Allowing this practice to continue will ultimately create more problems than it solves, leading to a drop in morale, performance and overall retention rates.
Peter Done is managing director of employment law firm Peninsula
