Telecommuting: big companies ready to go home
With pandemic concern growing again in Portugal and in the world, the scenario of returning to telework this winter was set by the Government this week. It is recommended from December 1st and mandatory for the first ten days of next year.
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Large companies are prepared to return to telecommuting. The Government recommended, from December 1st, the return of teleworking and binding it mandatory from January 2nd to 10th. Faced with the fifth wave of Covid-19 in the country, the companies ensure that they are permanently evaluating the situation.
“We are prepared for any eventuality. Caixa Geral de Depósitos was the first bank in Portugal to successfully put its ‘call center’ to work from home”, recalls the public bank.
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In the same direction, follow EDP, Galp, Infraestruturas de Portugal and Jerónimo Martins, who are also monitoring the evolution of the pandemic. If the Government moves in this direction next year, after January 10th, they will ensure that they will be able to place the office teams to produce from home.
“The group is prepared to work in any scenario that may be determined, equipped with tools, namely digital, for the remote work of employees performing the event”, says Jerónimo Martins, owner of Pingo Doce supermarkets.
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These companies, like many others in the country, started to return to the office in force in September. This month coincided with a new phase of the plan to return to normality, with 70% of the population vaccinated.
“Last October, a broader process of resuming face-to-face work and the normal functioning of the organization began, following the implementation of the last phase of opening provided by the Government”, reinforces Infraestruturas de Portugal. In this company, more than two thousand of the 3700 workers have to work in person, due to the type of functions they perform.
Like the other companies interviewed, they have adopted hybrid and flexible models, with two to three days of teleworking. “With the purpose of promoting related meetings between teams and favoring collaborative work”, explains Galp. In Microsoft technology, workers are recommended to work from home, but the doors are open for those who want to go to the office.
Even with the (temporary) return to normality, it is certain that telework has set up companies. Currently, the occupation of offices is by half. “EDP has been attentive to the evolution of the pandemic and currently has in place the hybrid work regime with a maximum occupancy of 50% of its offices”, says the electrician.
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Modality less and less present
At the end of September, practically one in ten workers (12.7%) was still working from home. The latest data from the National Institute of Statistics show that there were 617.6 thousand workers in telework that month.
This value is far from the peak registered in Portugal, between April and June 2020, when more than one million Portuguese (23.1%) performed their duties from their own homes.
Teleworking was no longer mandatory on August 1st, being only recommended. But that recommendation would come to fall in October, with the last phase of deconfinement in Portugal.
With the fifth wave to be defined, experts have recommended that this modality be adopted whenever possible, without harming the activity of companies and the lives of workers, so that it is possible to reduce mobility and contacts.
The employers, through the Business Confederation of Portugal, have warned the Government to generate “proportional measures” based on “objective data”, recalling that workplaces were not generalized focuses of infection.
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