Barclays has asked staff to return to the office an extra day per week (Image: Getty)
Barclays is the latest company to amend its flexible working policy, which has been in place since the pandemic.
The UK bank announced on Tuesday that tougher restrictions on working from home would apply to most of its 85,000 employees, according to a memo, the reports. The new policy increased the days in which Barclays’ employees are required in the office from two to three.
A hybrid model has been in place across the company for a while, yet front-office or client-facing staff, including investment bankers, are required to be in the office for five days a week.
A Barclays’ spokesperson said: “At Barclays, we recognise the benefits of balancing flexibility for colleagues with the importance of working together to collaborate in our physical locations. Our minimum time in office requirements vary between business areas depending on the nature of work and needs of the business.”
JPMorgan has asked staff to return to the office full time, five days a week (Image: Getty)
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The bank’s move follows JPMorgan’s announcement asking staff to return to the office full-time, five days a week, from March 2025. Lloyds Banking Group has echoed this too, as it said earlier this year that office attendance would be taken into account when awarding senior executives their bonuses.
Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs are two other major players in the finance sector that adopted the return of the five-day week. Back in 2021, in the midst of the pandemic, Goldman boss David Solomon labelled working from home as an “aberration”.
WPP, a British advertising group, is another company changing its hybrid policy, with more than 100,000 members of staff told to return to the office for at least four days a week from April. However, the request was not taken positively by staff, which launched a public petition attracting nearly 20,000 signatures.
Staff will be required in the office three days per week, rather than two (Image: Getty)
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One of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs, Lord Sugar, has backed calls for employees to return to the office full time. On his show The Apprentice, he said he wants to see all workers back in the workplace, claiming a lot of young people “just want to sit at home”.
He said: “I’m a great advocate of getting them back to work, because the only way an apprentice is going to learn is from his colleagues.”