One of the first questions asked at a job interview

Australia is to extend from 2025 the home office law, which was introduced in April 2021 in response to the epidemic, in response to societal needs and changing economic circumstances, under a new amendment to the law. Last year, a large-scale social survey in our western neighbour concluded that there is a need to further develop home-based working, namely through a law on teleworking, Economx.hu reports. Next year, workers will be able to work not only from home, but from any location of their choice: a café, a library, a holiday home, a hotel or even the waterfront - with accident insurance and a range of benefits. Teleworking will be available to all employees in the public and private sectors who regularly work with communications technology, i.e. computers and the internet, the newspaper quotes the essence of the amendment, which says that in Germany, too, the framework for working is becoming increasingly loose and teleworking is becoming more widespread, with half of German workers making strong use of it, according to a survey.

Teleworking is a new form of teleworking, which is becoming increasingly popular in Germany, too, according to a survey.

You can, but not from anywhere

In Germany, many companies allow teleworking, which has been gaining ground since the Covid epidemic, first out of necessity and then for employee convenience. "Is there a home office option?" that's among the top three questions in most white-collar jobs today, according to job fairs, and HR leaders presenting at various conferences report similar experiences with many of their employees at their companies. At Magyar Telekom, in response to HR Portal's enquiries, they said that they currently employ nearly 6,000 people, the vast majority of whom have telework contracts, which give them the opportunity to work remotely depending on their tasks. There are also areas within the company that work on a full teleworking basis, such as IT and customer service. Other colleagues - who do not have such contracts - typically operate technology systems or work in our shops where remote working is not feasible. They add that, in addition to other forms of flexible working, teleworking has long been a practice at Magyar Telekom, was part of the company culture even before the pandemic and has remained part of everyday life after the COVID period. At Telekom, we have found that the right combination of teleworking and office days ensures efficient working and helps to maintain and strengthen our flexible corporate culture. On average, this is 2-3 days a week when team members meet in the office, which can be a great time for inspiration, creative brainstorming and deepening personal relationships, while colleagues can choose to work from home for more in-depth tasks.

When asked whether teleworkers can work only at home or, as in Austria, at other locations, we were told that "colleagues must specify in their telework contract the location of the remote working, which is typically their home. Colleagues with a telework contract are not prevented from working remotely on a case-by-case basis if they have appropriate data security conditions, e.g. monitor protection, use of secure remote access, etc., but are not permitted to work remotely if the security criteria are not met". As regards regulation, they state that their telework policy includes a Handbook section in which they present to their colleagues the ergonomic and safety standards to be observed when teleworking, which they will familiarise themselves with when signing the contract. In response to one of the most sensitive questions we were asked about liability for accidents at work, they replied, "Based on our many years of experience, we can say that working from home does not pose a greater risk of accidents at work than working in an office, and we have not experienced any negative effects in this respect."

You can work in Hungary, but it doesn't matter where

Laszlo Szűcs, employment lawyer at PWC Legal, says that in companies where teleworking is allowed, the conditions are well defined. There are differences between EU countries in how much detail they regulate teleworking, but the principles are basically similar, he added. The Hungarian company practice - which is also in line with the Labour Code - is that teleworking can be carried out in Hungary in any place where the employee can meet these conditions and where the employer carries out the safety checks that may be necessary to ensure teleworking. As he said, this means that telework does not necessarily have to take place at the employee's registered permanent place of residence - even if many companies consider it to be home working - but practically any place that regularly carries out this activity separately from the usual place of work, which is the employer's head office or premises, is considered telework under Hungarian law and companies provide the possibility of working there.

In the last 1-2 years, many companies have had problems with the question of whether it is permissible for employees to work from their usual teleworking location and go on holiday or abroad. Practices in this respect have been different in many companies. Some companies allow teleworking from abroad, others explicitly prohibit it or allow it only in certain countries. Some countries do not have the same level of data security and data management as a European country. In European data security areas, employers generally allow teleworking, but in almost all cases the employee must declare where he or she wishes to telework and the employer may consider whether to allow it.

Safety at work

A legal requirement for teleworking in Hungary is that the parties must agree on the details. This usually sets out the location and conditions of teleworking, such as how the working time is accounted for, how many days a week the employee can telework (all days or a certain number of days), etc. Since teleworking is also a job, the employer must ensure the job safety conditions for the duration of the job, which in practice means that the employer must set the job safety conditions under which the telework can be carried out. For example, so that the worker can sit down properly and can carry out his or her work without disturbance. "The employer also sets conditions relating to information security, such as not allowing others to see if the employee is doing his or her work on the company's open pages. This can be particularly sensitive information, for example, in the case of a payroll clerk who opens up data on a laptop relating to an employee's earnings. The conditions for information security must be ensured for employees during teleworking," added Mr Szűcs. The legislation explicitly makes it difficult to work on an ICT device, the device of work must be practically the same as if the employee were working at the company's headquarters.

Working hours

In most places, the working hours are the same, and in most companies, employees must telecommute at the same time as if they were working at the head office, because if they are connected to the system, they can only work with colleagues on emails and internal company platforms if they are doing their work at the same time. It also follows that the rules on overtime are almost identical. In fact, there is only one difference, and that is the place of work, but the other conditions are the same between on-site and teleworking.

Compensation for teleworking

Companies also have different practices when it comes to reimbursement of expenses, explains PWC Legal's employment lawyer. There are companies that pay employees on a lump sum basis and there are also companies that account for employees on an itemised basis - the rarer of the two. But in most companies, no reimbursement is provided to employees to cover the cost of working from home. A significant number of companies still consider that it is a kind of benefit for the employee to work remotely, the cost of which should be borne by the employee.

Of those companies that do telework and are not state-owned, hybrid working is more common, meaning that employees usually work 2-3 days a week at the employer's headquarters and telework the rest of the time. However, there are some jobs - e.g. IT-type jobs, SSCs or BSCs - where teleworking is much more prevalent, including some types of jobs that are exclusively teleworking. Often, the employer only requires the employee to come to the workplace 1-2 times a month," the labour lawyer explained the national practice.

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