The aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic has driven an exponential increase in working from home and hybrid working opportunities. Flexible working can have inclusion and well-being advantages for employees and can be useful to employers when attracting and retaining talent. However, do employers always have to allow employees flexible working arrangements?

Under the Flexible Working Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015, an employer must seriously consider any application from an employee for flexible working arrangements, provided they have worked for the employer for at least 26 weeks. However, it is important to note that employees have the right to ask for flexible working but not the right to have it approved.

Employers can reasonably decline an employee’s application for flexible working for one of the following business reasons:

• Burden of additional costs;
• Detrimental effect on the ability to meet consumer demand;
• Inability to reorganise work among existing staff;
• Inability to recruit additional staff;
• Detrimental impact on quality;
• Detrimental impact on performance;
• Insufficiency of work during the periods the employee proposes to work;
• Planned structural changes.

Employers are required to inform employees of any decision to decline an employee’s flexible working request within 14 days of the date of the employer’s meeting about the application. This decision should take place within 3 months of the date of the request (or longer if agreed with the employee).

Legal Island Training Resources for Your Staff

Managing and Motivating Remote Workers | eLearning Course

Are you responsible for overseeing the implementation of training for all employees in your organisation?
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, organisations have offered office-based workers remote working options on a permanent basis. Therefore, it is necessary that managers are trained to optimise team performance. They also need to protect the wellbeing of each team member, whether they all work remotely, or some are based in the office and are part of a hybrid team.
Legal Island has created an eLearning course in partnership with Think People Consulting that will provide managers of remote workers with the tools to manage and motivate their teams, optimise performance, and achieve organisational goals.

Click here to view our course on managing and motivating remote workers.