Employers urged not to log off - September 07
With many employers calling for the outright ban of social networking and online shopping websites, leading South West law firm, Rickerbys warns businesses that they need to stay on the right side of the law.
A recent report suggests that sites such as ebay, Facebook and MySpace are costing UK companies £130m per day in wasted man hours. Employers nationwide are looking to combat the potential productivity crisis by implementing out right bans to certain sites.
The TUC has suggested such moves are somewhat draconian, but according to specialist employment lawyer and Rickerbys Partner, Matthew Clayton, Partner at Rickerbys, employers are well within their rights to do this.
“Clearly this is becoming a major problem for employers but there are steps which businesses can take in order to protect their interests whilst maintaining a good working relationship with their employees.
“Legally businesses are, of course, well within their rights to block access to websites that they see as detrimental and can monitor employee internet usage.
“Any restrictions put in place, however, must be clearly stated within the company’s IT usage policies which should be made available and understood by all employees."
Clayton does, however, warn that outright bans on social networking sites, such as Facebook, could be a step too far.
“Whilst the argument that these sites can be distractive, there is a belief that they are useful for business networking and this is clearly beneficial for organisations.
“Ultimately”, Clayton concludes, “the solution is for organisations to adopt IT usage policies that suit them. For many this is increasingly taking the form of a ‘happy medium’ with employers allowing access to social networking sites at specific times of the day. This is certainly the solution the TUC would recommend as it maintains a healthy employer-employee relationship which can actually increase productivity in the long run.”
Matthew Clayton, Partner in Rickerbys' Employment Team |