PeopleMuster

Work from home policy template

Remote work policies get written after the first bad week. Someone was unreachable for six hours, and nobody could point at a rule.

Use this for a team that works partly from home, or for a few people who work fully remote. A fully distributed company needs more than this, especially on equipment, tax and how people are hired in other countries.

WORK FROM HOME POLICY — [Company name]
Effective [date] · Owner: [HR lead]

1. WHO CAN WORK FROM HOME
Roles that do not need to be on site. [List the roles that cannot: reception,
lab, warehouse, anything tied to equipment here.] Staff on probation
[may / may not] until confirmed.

2. HOW MANY DAYS
Up to [2] days a week, booked [the week before]. [Or: fully remote by written
agreement with the department head.] Your manager can ask for a specific day
on site when a workshop or a client visit needs the room.

3. HOURS AND OVERLAP
Keep the same hours you keep on site. Be reachable between [11:00 and 16:00]
in [the company's main timezone]. Outside that window, answer within a day.

4. BEING REACHABLE
Status on [chat tool] stays current. If you step away for more than
[an hour] in overlap hours, say so in your team channel. A call you cannot
take gets a message back the same hour.

5. YOUR SETUP
You need a working internet connection, a quiet enough space for calls, and
somewhere you can work without back pain. The company provides [laptop,
headset, monitor]. [Say whether you contribute to internet or electricity,
and how much.]

6. WHEN THE POWER OR INTERNET GOES
Tell your team straight away by [phone or mobile data]. Work offline where
you can. If the outage lasts more than [3] hours, agree with your manager
whether the day is made up, taken as leave, or written off.

7. SECURITY AT HOME
Company work happens on company machines. Lock your screen. Do not use a
shared family computer for company systems. Do not print anything with
personal data on a home printer without asking [IT].

8. VISITS AND MEETINGS
[State how often a fully remote person is expected on site, if at all, and
who pays for travel.]

9. WITHDRAWING THE ARRANGEMENT
Remote work is a working arrangement, not an entitlement, and either side
can ask to revisit it with [four weeks'] notice. A withdrawal says why.

Approved by [name, title], [date].

Before you send it

  • Write clause 6 before you need it. Outages are the single most common source of remote-work resentment, and the argument is always about whether the day counts.
  • Overlap hours matter more than total hours once your team spans timezones. Name a window, name the timezone, and stop counting hours.
  • Where you pay towards home internet or electricity, the tax treatment of that payment differs by country. Ask your accountant before you fix an amount.
  • Some teams track remote days as a leave type with a quota. That is one way to hold a limit. Another is a manager's approval. Pick one and do not run both.
  • PeopleMuster takes attendance from a fingerprint terminal or from browser check-in. An admin switches browser check-in on, and it opens inside each person's shift window. A home day on an assigned shift is checked in from the browser, and a missed window becomes a manual punch request that HR reviews.

Questions people ask about this letter

Should remote days be requested or just taken?

Booked ahead beats requested for most teams. A booking is visible to the people who need the room. A request needs approving, which adds a queue for little gain.

What belongs in a home setup clause?

Connection, a space you can take a call in, and whatever hardware you supply. Resist listing furniture you have never checked. A clause you cannot verify is decoration.

Can a remote arrangement be withdrawn?

Usually yes, if the document says so and gives notice. Where remote work was agreed in a contract or as an adjustment for a health reason, changing it is a different matter. Take local advice on those cases.

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