According to an internal email, all Amazon employees will return to their permanent jobs from 2025. The company hopes this will lead to greater cohesion.
Since the coronavirus pandemic, many employees have been working from home: According to the Federal Statistical Office, almost 25 percent of all employed people in Germany worked from home at some point in 2023, and the trend is rising. But employers are apparently not always satisfied with this model.
Employees of the online mail order company Amazon will have to return to the office five days a week from the beginning of next year. Flexible working from home will then only be possible in exceptional cases, such as caring for a sick child or preparing for a major work task. Previously, the number of home office days had already been reduced from three to two.
In the future, Amazon will no longer offer flexible workplace bookings; each employee will once again be assigned a permanently assigned personal workplace in the office.
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SAP restricts home office
In Germany, too, managers of large corporations have repeatedly spoken out in recent months and advocated that people no longer work from home. As part of the “Back to Work” campaign, SAP CEO Christian Klein actively called on his employees to return to the office three days a week. In addition, he plans to categorize staff according to efficiency and teamwork skills from 2025, which will also have an impact on pay.
Is Amazon setting a precedent here with its announcement of 100 percent office space? After all, the USA is considered a pioneer of many trends that then spill over to Europe and Germany a few years later.
Consequences for German employees
Consultant and coach Inga Mende does not believe that. There have been some attempts by companies in this country to roll back the home office. “But the workforce often sent a clear message: ‘If you do that, you will have to expect consequences.’ That is why most companies shy away from taking such steps,” says Mende.
The working situation in the USA is difficult to compare with that in Germany. “In North America, many employers have long relied entirely on remote working, while those in Europe have always relied on hybrid models.” There is therefore no threat of a drastic turnaround like in the USA, says Mende, as many companies and employees in Germany have now adapted quite well to the respective home office rules. The trend towards hybrid working has “definitely prevailed and will remain so”.
This is also supported by the numerous job advertisements that explicitly offer home office. “Office workers who are looking for a job with a home office option are currently finding what they are looking for,” says Annina Hering, economist at the job portal Indeed. Almost 15 percent of the jobs available on Indeed include the option of working completely remotely or hybrid, and demand for this is high.
However, Mende believes that complete remote work will be the exception in Germany. “Smaller start-ups are using it to attract talent from all over the world and hire them on the best terms,” says Mende. Most companies have therefore held on to their commercial properties – unlike in the USA – albeit on a smaller scale. “Office space has been reduced in size, and instead more and larger interaction and workshop rooms have been created,” says Mende.
Is there a right to work from home? This is what a lawyer says
From a legal point of view, it could also be difficult to get employees to return to their desks. “If there is a works agreement, then what is regulated in it applies, even if management announces a back-to-office approach,” says labor law expert Professor Klaus-Stefan Hohenstatt from the law firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer.
The following point can also be of benefit to those affected: “Once companies have advertised home office and made firm commitments, it may be that an employment contract entitles employees to work part of their working hours from home. In this case, a change of contract may have to be issued, which would be very complicated from a legal perspective.” However, this option can also be restricted in individual cases, says Hohenstatt: “Restrictive wording can be, for example, ‘This only applies for a limited period’, ‘We can revoke this at any time’ or ‘We reserve the right to change this’.”
What employers could also do to order employees back to work: announce a transfer, which the works council must agree to. “If the works council says no, the labor court may have to replace the consent.”
The labor lawyer advises affected employees who are supposed to return to the office but do not want to and do not have a works council: “If there is no works council, then my only option is to comply with the order first and then have it checked by the courts to see whether the employer was actually authorized to give this instruction.”
Source: Stern
