remote working

Can employers insist that employees working remotely return to the office?

Marcus van Geyzel1 Comment

One of the biggest changes to career and workplace culture as a result of the pandemic has been remote working. While the concept of remote working and the even more extreme “digital nomad” lifestyle is not new, there is no doubt that the pandemic and resultant lockdowns greatly accelerated the adoption of remote working, particularly in the more traditional industries and professions.

We have previously featured the views of employees on how remote working has changed the way their work (“Lessons from Lockdown: How COVID-19 and remote working have changed the way we work”), and also published insights from young lawyers on the legal industry’s experience with remote working (“COVID, MCO, and the Malaysian legal industry — Part 1: Money (paycuts, revenue), remote working, and technology”).

Employers now want employees back in the office

However, in the second half of 2022, this trend reversed. Employers who in 2020-21 seemed to have been convinced of the viability of allowing employees to work remotely or flexibly began to introduce policies mandating that employees needed to be in the office for a specified number of days each week.

In many industries, employees have been reluctant to return fulltime to the office, and compliance with these new directives has been mixed — it is common for employers to report that a “three days per week in the office” policy sees employees turning up for only two days each week.

It has been in the news in the past week that Apple are threatening disciplinary action against employees who fail to come into the office three days a week. Apple are reportedly tracking employee in-office attendance and will give employees escalating warnings, which could result in termination.

Many multinational businesses are similarly seeking to enforce these new directives more strictly in the different jurisdictions they operate in, and are finding that doing so can be legally complicated.

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Five lawyers share their insights on the impact of the Employment Act amendments

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The past three years has been a busy, tumultuous, and very interesting period for HR and employment and industrial relations professionals in Malaysia. While 2020-21 saw employment lawyers — like most of the world — being kept occupied by the effects of the pandemic, and collectively learning on our feet, 2022 also threw lots of new issues our way, as clients adjusted to the new post-pandemic norms.

In Malaysia, a hot topic in 2022 was the long-awaited amendments to the Employment Act (“EA”)(originally scheduled to come into force on 1 September 2022, but postponed to 1 January 2023). I have already shared my views on the wide-ranging impact of (and some on-going uncertainty caused by) these major amendments. In this article, I canvassed the views of five fellow Malaysian employment lawyers on the EA amendments. I invited Amardeep Singh Toor, Donovan Cheah, Janice Anne Leo, Selvamalar Alagaratnam, and Wong Keat Ching to share insights on the following with readers of The Malaysian Lawyer:

  • Their views on the EA amendments.
  • The key areas their clients have been focusing on to adapt to the changes.
  • Whether there is still non-compliance among employers.
  • What issues/trends will keep employment lawyers busy this year.

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Flexible Working Arrangements: What employers should include in a Flexible Working Policy and other recommended documents

Marcus van Geyzel1 Comment

Pursuant to changes contained in the Employment (Amendment) Act 2022 (“the Amendment Act”), which the government has announced will come into force on 1 September 2022, employees in Malaysia will be allowed to apply to their employer for a Flexible Working Arrangement (“FWA”). (For a more comprehensive look at the changes under the Amendment Act, read my earlier article: “Malaysia Employment Act amendments: 7 key changes for employers to note”)

The introduction of FWAs under the Amendment Act is the first time that FWAs have been formally recognised in Malaysia, and may be the first of many such changes — the government has also shared that it is conducting studies on the feasibility of a four-day working week. Malaysian employers can expect FWAs to become more commonplace in the near future, and must start preparing now. Several of my clients are already putting in place the necessary flexible working policies and other related documents to not only ensure that they are not caught unprepared come the 1st of September, but also to lay the foundations for the anticipated changes in the next couple of years.

This article sets out the essential points that need to be covered in a Flexible Working Policy, and also other recommended administrative/HR documents that employers should strongly consider putting into place to smoothly accommodate FWAs.

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Lessons from Lockdown: How COVID-19 and remote working have changed the way we work

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2020 has been the year of COVID-19. The pandemic has affected every aspect of life in almost every corner of the globe. Apart from the devastating impact on health and lives, and the effect on economies everywhere which may take years to recover from, COVID-19 has changed the way we work. Malaysia’s Movement Control Order (“MCO”) meant that from 18 March, most businesses had to cease on-site operations. Many other countries also enforced similar restrictions.

As a result of restrictions, people the world over have had to get used to working from home. While the concept of remote working isn’t new (it may come as a surprise to many that Tim Ferriss’ classic “The 4-Hour Workweek” was published 13 years ago), before these restrictions most industries had resisted the shift to working away from the office. The COVID-19 restrictions have forced even the staunchest luddites to adopt remote working.

We sought the views of the following four individuals with links to the legal industry across Asia-Pacific to hear about their work-from-home experiences:

  1. Crystal Wong, a partner in the Energy, Infrastructure & Projects and International Arbitration Practice Group at LHAG.
  2. Gaythri Raman, the Managing Director, Southeast Asia at LexisNexis.
  3. Jeannette Tam, a Senior Managing Associate at Bird & Bird Hong Kong.
  4. Zamir Hamdy Hamdan, the Asst Vice President for Stakeholder Management in Astro Malaysia‘s Human Capital Division.

We’re sure you’ll enjoy reading their insights.

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