Information request and response under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002
FOI reference: FOI/202100264794
Date received: 30 Nov 2021
Date responded: 22 Dec 2021
Information requested
The number of employees in your organisation and, of these, the number able to perform their work remotely (i.e., not those who are front-line workers) and the number who have started returning to in person work.
The following questions refer to the members of the workforce who are able to work remotely. Please provide in spreadsheet or text format as appropriate:
- Since the start of the pandemic in March 2020, what has your organisational policy to employees working from home vs coming into work in person?
- Please explain this in terms of change to previous policy and how this has changed over the course of the pandemic. For example: “Prior to the pandemic, most staff were expected to work in person (except for managers who were able to work from home 2 days a week). When the pandemic started, all staff were sent to work from home, until August when some staff began to return to the office”.
- Did your organisation have enough of the basic equipment needed for transitioning to remote working during the pandemic? If not – how long did it take to provide everyone with the basic equipment (laptops) they required and implement remote-working?
- Did you provide further equipment at any point e.g. laptop stands, chairs, desks etc? If so what did you provide and was this based on a specified value (if so, how much was spent per remote worker)?
- Has your organisation created a policy for reversing the option for working from home and/or creating new hybrid working patterns, or returning fully to ‘pre-pandemic’ practices?
- If yes, please provide details of your policy including how many days a week you will be aiming to have employees working in person and by what specific date or date range you are aiming to achieve this.
- Has this changed or been delayed considering the government briefing on 29th November regarding the new Omicron Covid variant and updated advice?
- Did you consult your employees about their attitudes to returning to in person work? If so, please provide details of their responses (e.g. did you create a survey; if so, how many people responded and what % were in favour or against returning to the office?)
- Have you implemented any changes to pay for those working from home and if so, please describe the average change in pay rates and who it applies to.
- Were these changes implemented immediately or are you, for example, keeping current staff on the same pay but starting new remote employees on a lower rate?
- On what rationale have you made changes to pay?
Response
Please refer to attached Annex.
About FOI
Social Security Scotland is committed to publishing its response to requests. The Scottish Government also publishes responses to requests. You can view the responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.
FOI 202100264794 Information Released Annex