The tumultuous divide between full - time faculty and contract bridge workers atFacebookandGooglehas come to a head recently , with this distinction now purportedly limit who merit to work from home amid an ongoingglobal pandemic .
Throughout this week , several big names in tech have begun recommending that their work force telecommute as a precautionary measure to deflect potentially spreading COVID-19 , the respiratory illness that ’s surpassed125,000 confirmed cases worldwide . Google ’s parent company Alphabet has asked all itsNorth American employees to work remotely through April 10 , with that same guidance subsequently pushed out to the company ’s staffers in Europe , Africa and the Middle East . Facebook later announce a similar policy : “ We are extending our world-wide guidance to allow anyone whose line allows them to do so , to voluntarily work remotely through Friday , April 10 , ” reads a company statement provided toCNNThursday .
Butaccording tomultiplereports , such companywide directives do n’t seem to hold to many of Facebook or Google ’s across-the-board connection of subcontractors and temporary worker , who are technically employed by third - party agencies and do n’t have approach to the same welfare as full - time employee .
Photo: Getty
At Google , where , by most estimates , contractor make up half the company ’s total staff , company policy forestall some members of its so - called“extended workforce”from get at their tasks remotely . A Google spokesperson toldthe Guardianthat employee and contractors whose work need they be physically present on - site work were still necessitate to add up in . A Google spokesperson emphasize in an email to Gizmodo that , as with the party ’s contractors , staffer whose study need them to be on the society ’s campuses must still show up .
“ To attend to our users and keep our products function , some work , perform by Google employee , temporary staff and trafficker alike , can only be done by people physically present at bureau , ” a Google spokesperson say in a assertion . “ We ’re carry all necessary and recommended precautions , including increased sanitization and societal distancing , a public wellness best practice . ”
The caller announce on March 10 that it wasopening a stock to provide paid grisly leaveto third - political party contractors , but did not go into detail about when proletarian would begin to see these benefit .
https://gizmodo.com/amazon-finally-sets-up-a-coronavirus-relief-fund-for-1842276731
Which , clearly , is n’t going over well with a contingent of workers that have historically felt sidelined byGoogle ’s crappy , preferential intervention .
“ Our second - class condition now has literal wellness implications , ” Josh Borden , a triage analyst for Google , say the Guardian . Because of this , he said , his fellow coworkers have start to feel that the company ’s abandoned them or that their health is n’t believe a priority compared to full - time staffers .
“ The FTEs [ full - time employee ] almost all seem to be heeding the recommendation to work from habitation , while we are model here in the Petri sweetheart , with the choice of not getting paid , or mayhap getting sick and then putting our kinsfolk and friends at risk too , ” he go along .
That prevailing position seemingly is n’t much different at Facebook , per a recentIntercept report . The issue critique several posts from an home society meeting place where workers from Accenture and WiPro , contracting agencies with facilities in Austin , Texas , and Mountain View , California , shop late policies that seem to pit their jobs against their wellness .
One Accenture contractile organ place that the company ask employee to proceed work on - situation unless they showed grippe - like symptoms . The contractor start on to describe how they “ just saw 3 people get send out home and we ’re all still in the office trying to focus on our oeuvre like cross contamination does n’t survive for 14 24-hour interval prior to symptoms showing up … At this point , I ’m at a loss , ” per the report .
Another Accenture employee tell the Intercept that their full 20 - person team had been banned from work remotely . One forum postal service also described how , after take 60 minutes about the office , they were told they need a note from an immunocompromised home member to show “ a legitimate concern ” for requesting sick leave of absence . “ This all seems quite insubstantial , ” they wrote .
https://gizmodo.com/google-asks-all-u-s-staff-to-work-from-home-as-covid-1-1842253299
Frustrating things further , third - party federal agency and Facebook have purportedly given negate answers about contractile organ ’ options should they need to rest home sick . harmonize to several employee on the forum , Accenture had inform them that “ dependant upon workers can prefer either unpaid sick leave or use PTO . They are not , however , allowed to have paid disturbed parting . ” However , another assembly mail from a Facebook employee in charge of Accenture staff claimed the precise antonym , that “ if any contingent worker falls ill and needs to take time to recover , they do not need to practice their sick or PTO prison term . ”
A Facebook spokesperson told the Intercept that it ’s presently looking into ways to temporarily enable remote option for jobs that — for privacy and legal reasons — typically require employees to be at the function . The company ’s also supposedly “ take extra step to limit link for those in the situation , like physically spreading people out , limiting in - person meetings , eradicate social visitors , making changes to food military service , increase office cleaning and encouraging people who do n’t call for to be in the office to stay home . ”
Update March 14 : Added assertion from Google spokesperson .
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