Flexible working and return to the office tips

CIPD HR-inform. Croner.

Stacie Cheadle, technical writer at Croner, explains what employers need to consider on hybrid working and return to office demands, stressing importance of a balanced approach.

Flexible working has moved from being a specialist benefit to an expected part of working life. While some employers are now asking employees to spend more time in the office, the evidence suggests that a successful approach is unlikely to be found in a simple choice between home and office working.

The CIPD Good Work Index 2026 reports that 57% of employees work from home for at least part of their working time, while 8% work fully from home. However, homeworking is becoming less dominant. The proportion of employees working from home for more than half of their time fell from 52% in 2021 to 28% in 2026, while the proportion working from home for half or less of their time rose to 29%. In addition, 43% of employees do not work from home at all, compared with 38% in 2021. However, bear in mind these figures cover all industry sectors.

A growing number of employers are introducing mandatory office days. Barclays, for example, has told staff who were attending the office two days a week to attend at least three days from October 2026. Senior leaders are expected to attend at least four days, while some investment banking employees are expected to work in the office five days a week. The policy has attracted opposition from Unite, with 94% of respondents to the union’s survey saying the changes should be delayed until consultation had concluded.

This highlights the practical difficulties of increasing office attendance. Employees may face higher commuting, parking, travel and childcare costs. Others may have built their working arrangements around caring responsibilities, disability-related needs or long travel distances. This is something employers working towards increased office attendance need to carefully consider and find ways to counter.

There are also trade-offs. Fully home-based employees report lower exhaustion and stress but higher loneliness, and they may have weaker relationships with colleagues. Employers asking people to return should use office days purposefully, focusing on collaboration, learning, client work, mentoring and team connection rather than requiring attendance without a clear reason.

Practical steps

For employers looking to move towards increased office attendance, practical steps that can be taken include reviewing contractual terms, checking whether the proposed change alters the employee’s normal place of work, and consulting properly before implementation.

A blanket instruction may create risks of breach of contract, constructive unfair dismissal or discrimination if it disadvantages employees with a protected characteristic.

Employers should document the business rationale, assess equality impacts, listen to individual concerns and consider alternatives such as different office days, adjusted hours, compressed hours or travel support.

Looking to the future

The government is introducing further flexible working reforms under the Employment Rights Act 2025 next year. This is intended to make it more likely that reasonable and feasible requests are accepted, while preserving the employer’s ability to refuse requests for genuine operational reasons.

When an employer is considering refusing a request, the proposed statutory process will require constructive engagement with the employee. Employers will need to discuss the difficulties created by the request, explore whether those difficulties can be overcome and consider alternative or modified arrangements.

If the request is refused, the employer will need to explain why the refusal is reasonable, identify the relevant statutory business ground and set out the factual basis for the decision.

The changes are expected to take effect in autumn 2027 through secondary legislation, with updated Acas guidance.

Employers should use the time now to review policies, train managers, improve record-keeping and ensure decisions are evidence-based. A balanced hybrid strategy will usually be more sustainable than an inflexible return-to-office mandate.

By Stacie Cheadle, technical writer at Croner

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