United service union home office and mobile work

Due to the corona pandemic, the proportion of people working from home has increased significantly. On the one hand, this is due to the fact that within a short period of time, significantly more employees were no longer working in the office, at least at times. In the short time available, however, it was not always possible for employers to set up suitable workplaces at the employees' homes, and there was also a lack of technical equipment such as laptops, etc. Ergonomic requirements for workplace design were therefore not always met, so that one has to speak of mobile work here.

In the SARS-COV-2 occupational safety regulation of the Federal Ministry of Labor (BMAS), which came into force on August 10th, 2020, home office was legally defined for the first time as a form of mobile working with the note that the regulations of the ArbStättV on teleworking remain unaffected. There it said under point 4.2.4.: “(1) Home office as a form of mobile work offers an opportunity to reduce the number of employees present in the company at the same time and to support compliance with distance rules. This applies in particular if office space would otherwise have to be used by several employees if the distance rule is not observed.” After the pandemic, there will still be a lot to be regulated in this regard or regulations will have to be revised if employees want and can continue to work outside of their office workplace. Interest groups such as works councils and staff councils are also asked to do this.