The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Is attendance essential?
Some employees at companies deemed vital say they still should be able to work from home
STAMFORD — Gov. Ned Lamont’s stay-at-home order, which told many Connecticut businesses to close up shop in order to help halt the spread of the novel coronavirus, came with a long list of “essential” workplaces that should stay open.
What was less than clear in the order was whether those operations still should allow or require employees to work from home, or whether the “essential” tag authorized an employer to mandate that workers report to the office every day.
Even before the order was issued, employees at several workplaces in the city were at odds with their management over rules that required them to use vacation, sick or personal days in order to work from home and distance themselves from colleagues during the pandemic.
The majority of Stamford businesses have gone to “skeleton crews,” according to Arthur Augustyn, a spokesman for Mayor David Martin.
But the city has received “a handful of concerns and addressed them with the employers,” Augustyn said. He declined to name those employers.
“We’re working with businesses to ensure they’re compliant, and every business has been very responsive to recommendations,” Augustyn said. “We have not seen an instance of unsafe working conditions. But if we did, we would pursue taking action to ensure the public’s health.”
Employee exposure
Perhaps the most vocal outcry in the city has come from employees of telecommunications giant Charter Communications.
Charter staff who spoke with Hearst Connecticut Media said they were angered by CEO and Chairman Tom Rutledge’s March 14 email that said the company’s approximately 95,000 employees across the country would be expected to keep reporting to work unless they were sick or caring for someone who was ill. It was a week before the governor’s order went out, but many other employers already had sent employees home or were in the process of doing so.
The company’s workforce includes more than 80,000 “frontline” staff nationwide — including maintenance and construction technicians, customer-service specialists and sales professionals. They deliver Spectrum-branded internet, cable and phone services to approximately 29 million customers across 41 states.
But the directive also applied to the company’s office workers, including those based in the city. One of Stamford’s largest employers and a Fortune 100 company, Charter employs more than 1,300 who work across 10 floors at 400 Atlantic St. and in offices in the adjacent building at 201 Tresser Blvd.
“We provide critical communications services, and we believe our approach to supporting frontline employees is the right way for us to operate at this time to continue to deliver those important services to our customers,” Rutledge said in the email.
“While some back office and management functions can be performed remotely, they are more effective from the office,” Rutledge also said in the email.
Employees said their ire grew as time went on and they still were told to report to the office, even, at times, after some employees appeared to be sick. On March 20, three Stamfordbased workers called out sick after they indicated that they had some COVID-19 symptoms, according to a March 22 company email to employees. Remaining workers on the seventh floor of 400 Atlantic were asked to leave so that the floor could undergo a cleaning.
Later that day, another employee came forward with information related to possible COVID-19 exposure, the March 22 email said.
The affected floors at 400 Atlantic and 201 Tresser then underwent “full and thorough” cleanings, while common areas were also cleaned in accordance with CDC guidelines, according to Charter officials.
Some employees were asked to self-quarantine — but others were told to plan to report to work in their offices the following Monday unless their supervisors directed them otherwise, the March 22 email said. A separate email, on March 21, also told employees that they should keep coming to work and that they should show their Charter identification badges if they were stopped
by authorities on their way.
As the March 20 incidents unfolded, “the atmosphere in the office took a turn, from frustrated and angry employees to scared ones,” said an employee.
That employee and other workers who spoke with Hearst Connecticut Media for this article asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak publicly about their companies’ policies.
In response to employee complaints, Charter has made concessions. On March 19, it offered an additional three weeks of paid time off this year and pledged to allow some remote working.
Charter said in a statement to Hearst Connecticut Media that it would “provide the option for remote work to employees whose jobs allow them to work outside the office without endangering our obligation to provide critical services.”
Its recent changes “will help our
employees manage through this difficult time while maintaining our vital broadband internet services to our customers, including hospitals, emergency first responders, government facilities and media,” the statement also said.
An email that was sent Monday to at least one group of employees outlined conditions under which certain positions could work remotely.
Senior management would continue to work on-site, the email said. That group includes supervisors of at least 20 employees, anyone with a title of vice president or above or a director who is a regional or operational function leader.
In response to a follow-up inquiry from Hearst Connecticut Media about how many Stamford-based employees had been allowed to work outside their offices, Charter declined to elaborate on the details of its remote-work options.