Australian workers now have the 'right to disconnect'
Australian workers now have the 'right to disconnect'
A law giving workers the legal "right to disconnect" from work has come into effect in Australia. This gives workers the right to ignore unreasonable contact from their employers outside of work hours.
Australian workers will now have the legal "right to disconnect" from work, as per a rule which came into effect on Monday. This means they can now ignore their bosses' emails, phone calls, and texts outside of work hours.
It entitles employees to ignore out-of-hours attempts by employers to contact them unless this refusal is deemed to become "unreasonable."
"We want to make sure that just as people don't get paid 24 hours a day, they don't have to work for 24 hours a day. It's a mental health issue, frankly, as well, for people to be able to disconnect from their work and connect with their family and their life," Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in an interview with national broadcaster ABC.
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What difference does it make that the email is sent after work hours or not? It'll still be in their inbox the morning after.
Not trying to be facetious here, we have similar laws where I live, and employers respect that.
But all it changes is that you have to do a lot more in the 9 hours a day you're on duty. The clients' needs don't just stop at 17.00. Either I voluntarily work through my lunches and evenings, or I get replaced by someone who does or who can somehow cram 14h of labor in 8h.
Uuuh, pretty sure you're still allowed to read your work email off-hours, or get some shit done if you feel like it.
This just means you can't be fired for, you know, having a life.
The difference is you can go to sleep without work constantly looming over you.
This also prevents a back and forth email chain that could last til the morning.
Sounds like maybe your work place is understaffed tbh. I recognise I'm saying this from a position of privilege, but that sounds like the company's problem. Not yours.
Though as others have said, the law doesn't prevent you from working overtime if you want to. I hope the pay is worth it at least.
We are understaffed. We've had an opening for my own job (well, not mine but the same position) for well over 2 years now without filling it.
We're also all salaried, so no overtime...