How far should employers go to protect health and wellbeing at home?
Under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, it’s an employer’s duty to protect the health, safety and welfare of their employees and this extends to providing employees with a safe working environment. How far does this obligation go when employees work from home?
Employers usually have obligations under legislation, contract law and common law. This means there is an obligation to take reasonable care of their staff’s health and safety, and avoid exposure to unnecessary risks, to ensure a safe system of working. Importantly, these requirements apply to both physical and mental health.
When employees are based in an office, it’s likely employers will already have considered their responsibilities and the steps to take to protect staff and their wellbeing. Some employers will consider their responsibilities for the wellbeing of office workers to extend to providing fruit bowls, encouraging employees to drink more water and taking breaks from workstations at lunch time. However, with employees working from home, what steps, if any, should employers be taking to continue to comply with their legal obligations? Should the same measures be put in place for homeworkers? Should employers be encouraging employees to get up and exercise at home, or even to eat healthy food at home?
There is no set guidance or legislation on how far this duty extends. Fundamentally, the principles of an employer’s duty of care to be met are the same regardless of the working location of the employee. Employers have the same responsibilities for employees working at home as they do for staff in the workplace. The Health and Safety Executive provides guidance stating the importance of protecting homeworkers.
When considering employers’ responsibilities and the reasonable steps an employer should take to protect homeworkers’ health and safety, employers may decide that while the legal position is the same, the practicalities are distinctively different. Therefore, new initiatives are needed. At a basic level, this may involve making regular contact with teams to avoid loneliness, adapting duties and/or hours to accommodate childcare responsibilities to manage stress or scheduling morning team calls to ‘check in’. Is this enough to satisfy an employer’s obligations for the health and safety of their homeworkers? The short answer is it will depend on each scenario and the risk assessments undertaken. So, carrying out risk assessments is something an employer should be doing as a minimum.
Some employers take their view on their obligations a step further and see encouraging a healthy lifestyle and staying active as part of their duty of care. At present there is no legal obligation on employers to monitor exercise and eating habits of homeworkers.
There is a careful balancing act between adhering to legal responsibilities for physical and mental health and intruding on staff’s private lives. This balance may be achieved by providing staff with support and the tools to monitor their own wellbeing at home while asking them to think about staying active. This is particularly important for those with sedentary jobs.
It is also worth introducing initiatives to support employees with the challenges of working from home, not only from a health and safety angle but also to engage and nurture employees. Assisting employees to engage with a healthy lifestyle provides benefits for employers too, such as increased productivity, better staff retention and increased morale.
People thrive on friendships and good social interaction, and employees who have positive relationships in the workplace are more likely to enjoy coming to work and be productive when they get there. The importance of the quality of the professional relationship between employees and their line manager cannot be emphasised enough.
As we look to a future that is likely to involve more hybrid working, with part of the time homeworking, it’s worth considering developing a distinct benefits package for permanent and hybrid homeworkers. For permanent homeworking this would be designed to help them look after their physical and mental wellbeing at home. Employees who are hybrid homeworking or permanently based at home are less likely to be interested in health initiatives such as office gym memberships or cycle to work schemes, so it is worth exploring alternatives.
Employers will need to adjust current thinking to be able to continue to recruit and retain the best employees who are not based in the office all the time. Taking a fresh approach to looking after health and safety is likely to involve an innovative, flexible and a more tailored approach than in the past, to maximise the benefits for all.
Pam Loch, Employment Solicitor and Managing Director, and Roisin Kavanagh, Employment Solicitor at Loch Employment Law.
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