Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 449 posts

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#51

Post by StressedDev »

sfpotter wrote: post #23
rufus_foreman wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What stops my employer from potentially disciplining or firing me is first of all, that I am good at what I do, and second that I negotiate from a position of strength. If my employer wants me to work off hours, I mean maybe I will, if I don't have anything going on, and I'll take some time the next day where I won't work as compensation for doing that, I won't ask permission. If I do have something going on, I'll sa…

Sounds like you live in a world of incredible privilege. Not everyone is so lucky.

Nope - A large portion of the world works like this. If you work for a place which demands you work all of the time, you either work for an abusive employer, or you get paid a lot of money to be at their beck and call.

If the employer is abusive, find another job. If you are paid a large salary to be a slave to company, consider finding a job with a better work/life balance.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#52

Post by RachelF »

nwbort wrote: post #10

Yes, but 'Employers should be able to justify contacting professionals after hours based on common contract clauses that say a worker’s high salary includes reasonable overtime'. See: https://www.afr.com/work-and-careers/workplace/the-right-to-...

For me, the interesting thing about Japanese work culture is that they pay white collar jobs overtime.

Paid overtime seems to be a blue-collar only thing in most English-speaking countries.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#53

Post by taneq »

selcuka wrote: post #11

> To cater for emergencies and jobs with irregular hours, the rule still allows employers to contact their workers, who can only refuse to respond where it is reasonable to do so. This clause pretty much invalidates the rest of the rule. Why should an employee need to justify their inability (or unwillingness) to respond? I can understand the "jobs with irregular hours", but otherwise shouldn't it be a best effort th…

> who can only refuse to respond where it is reasonable to do so

What does this even mean? I didn't think employees had an obligation to respond at all? Presumably it's actually "whose right to refuse contact is only protected by law where it is reasonable for it to be so."

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#54

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

dopylitty wrote: post #47
Aurornis wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "the crud app you support fell over" is not an emergency. I think a lot of people are going to be disappointed to learn that situations impacting business-critical operations would be considered emergencies. The assumption that Australia just outlawed the concept of having an on-call rotation is not supported by the article. The article says requiring an employee to be on-call 24/7 for general purposes would indeed…

> But completely eliminating planned on-call rotations is not part of the goal. It certainly should be. You want your app supported 24x7 then pay for three shifts. If the government won’t make it a law then IT workers can make it a demand when they unionize.

Sounds like a great deal for the lucky 1/3 of developers who get assigned the day shift, but isn't it pretty rough for the majority? I'd much rather keep a normal schedule and get woken up every once in a while than work 5pm-1am or 1am-9am.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#55

Post by jay_kyburz »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #4
billybuckwheat wrote: post #3

I don't live or work in any of those places, but I've been ignoring work emails and calls after hours for a long time. Helps that 1) I don't have a work phone, 2) apps that my company uses on my personal phone, and 3) never log into the company network or services on my own laptop. In the few instances when I was called out about it, I asked Could the message/call have waited until the following morning/Monday? The a…

This does not stop an employer from potentially disciplining or firing you. Laws do, because they bind. Implicit contracts and hope are not a strategy, with regards to worker rights and protections.

I'm no lawyer, but I am an Australian and know the hoops you need to jump through in order to fire a full time employee.

An employer who is prepared to put in writing that you will be fired for not working unpaid overtime (responding to email) is in for bad time.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#56

Post by coderenegade »

nomilk wrote: post #29
joshgermon wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you rely on exploiting the fact that your employee does not have the right to ignore your call outside of hours, your business shouldn't exist. What kind of take is this? It says it gives them the right to ignore, not to sue the business if they do call.

Employees benefit from calls out of hours. How? The employer is able to offer better service to customers, and make more money, and the employee can negotiate a higher salary from the more profitable business. Employees who are inflexible cannot offer the same level of service to their employer and its customers; they'll on-average be paid less and measures like this increase production costs, making goods and servic…

Nice in theory, but I've generated a tremendous amount of value for some of the places I've worked at, and it's rare to see any of it flow back the other way. Secondly, this is a right. An employee can waive that right if they choose, but they have the power. They can't be punished for exercising it, which is the important part.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#57

Post by djbusby »

joshgermon wrote: post #41
nomilk wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Employees benefit from calls out of hours. How? The employer is able to offer better service to customers, and make more money, and the employee can negotiate a higher salary from the more profitable business. Employees who are inflexible cannot offer the same level of service to their employer and its customers; they'll on-average be paid less and measures like this increase production costs, making goods and servic…

Yes, we know increased profits always go to the worker. Particularly when the business needs to rely on exploiting them to make those increased profits. Let me try your logic here... Employees benefit from no paid annual leave! How you ask? The employer is able to offer better service to customers, and make more money, and the employee can negotiate a higher salary from the more profitable business. Am I doing this r…

You forgot the part where individual workers are great at negotiating against a large entity.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#58

Post by ghiculescu »

Lots of people missing nuance or seeing this rule change say what they want it to say, rather than what it actually says.

Employers are still allowed to contact employees anytime.

Previously you could theoretically be terminated for not reading or replying to messages from your employer outside hours. Now there are restrictions on that. That’s all that’s changed.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#59

Post by coderenegade »

nomilk wrote: post #46
joshgermon wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, we know increased profits always go to the worker. Particularly when the business needs to rely on exploiting them to make those increased profits. Let me try your logic here... Employees benefit from no paid annual leave! How you ask? The employer is able to offer better service to customers, and make more money, and the employee can negotiate a higher salary from the more profitable business. Am I doing this r…

Start with a theoretical employee who offers no value and gets paid zero. Dial up their usefulness and consider what happens. The greater the value an employee offers, the stronger their negotiation power in pay discussions. It's not more complicated than that.

Start with a theoretical employee who offers excellent usefulness and is paid accordingly. Dial down the legal protections and security and consider what happens. The weaker the security of the employee, the stronger the negotiating power of the employer in pay discussions. It's not more complicated than that.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#60

Post by ludston »

My personal experience is that Australia doesn't have a huge problem with this generally. But mileage may vary. If it were a huge problem then vested interests would lobby fiercely against the law, and it seemed to pass without much challenge or comment from the public here.

This law might seem like a big deal if you're working in a place without labour protection laws, and therefore you're used to constant abuse from management and live in permanent anxiety of some petty retaliation. But here it really ought to just be a formalisation of normality unless you're working with particularly poor managers.

Post reply on HN