Feds: is remote elegibility equitable at your D/A?

[Anonymous]

At ours, people with exactly the same jobs are differently considered for remote eligibility. Is this common elsewhere?

[Anonymous]

No. It's usually the same across the board. You should complain if yours is not that way.

[Anonymous]

Nope, not at all and totally opaque. Definitely people with same positions/ same jobs considered differently. They say they are taking health considerations into account but from what I’ve seen is that it’s basically a “yes, remote approved” to anyone who was bold enough to move away during COVID and “no, not approved” to anyone asking permission first. Totally backwards.

[Anonymous]

It depends on what you mean by "same job." Can two people with the same title or job code but working in different offices have disparate eligibility to telework? Yes, absolutely. Performance ratings can be a factor too but of course this is private.

[Anonymous]

We have people who, prior to the pandemic, were fully remote. They got grandfathered into a legacy preferential status that is not available to other employees today. I’ve now seen this at multiple fin reg agencies.

They can’t give up their current positions because they won’t get it back.

[Anonymous]

The “fairness” issue is very high on staff concerns. Basically whatever you implement do it fairly. Not going well.

[Anonymous]

My agency doesn't care so much about every position being treated the same but whether the supervisor treats their team fairly. So each supervisor decides if all their employees can go remote or if everyone is in office.

[Anonymous]

At my agency almost no positions are remote, but if they are, it's based on the nature of the job, so everyone in that position is eligible for remote work. So, I'd say it's equitable.

[Anonymous]

Same across the board ASSUMING telework criteria are met. This basically means you can't have a bad performance rating. But you have to work really, really hard to get a bad rating. So yes it is equitable.