{"id":266093,"date":"2025-11-06T08:14:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-06T08:14:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/266093\/"},"modified":"2025-11-06T08:14:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T08:14:14","slug":"banks-under-pressure-to-review-work-from-home-cases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/266093\/","title":{"rendered":"Banks under pressure to review work-from-home cases"},"content":{"rendered":"

T\ufeffhe bosses of Australia’s big banks have been warned they face a flood of cases unless they reassess rejected work-from-home requests.<\/p>\n

The Finance Sector Union (FSU) said today it has written to senior executives in the sector calling for them to review their flexible work policies following a landmark decision against Westpac.<\/p>\n

The ruling found the bank acted unlawfully when it denied a workers’ request to work from home.<\/p>\n

\"AThe Finance Sector Union has urged Australia’s ‘big four’ banks to review rejected applications by employees for working from home arrangements.. (AAP Image\/Joel Carrett)<\/p>\n

In a letter, the FSU warns that employers could be breaching workplace law if they continue to reject flexible work requests without proper consideration, consultation or justification.<\/p>\n

The Fair Work Commission ruled Karlene Chandler had the right to work from home full time after Westpac failed in its obligations under the Fair Work Act.<\/p>\n

She sought to work remotely from her home south of Sydney to enable her to carry out school drop-offs and pick-ups for her two young children.\ufeff<\/p>\n

The bank’s failures included not responding within 21 days, not engaging genuinely with Chandler’s request and not providing her specific reasons for refusing it, the commission found.<\/p>\n

The FSU says the ruling sets a precedent that will have far-reaching consequences across the finance sector.<\/p>\n

\"workWorking from home has become increasingly popular since the pandemic. (Getty)<\/p>\n

It claims many employers have sought to impose blanket return-to-office mandates without consideration for workers’ personal circumstances.<\/p>\n

The FSU has identified other examples of work-from-home arrangement by finance workers that have \ufeffbeen rejected by managers.<\/p>\n

“Our members have proven they can deliver from home,” said National Assistant Secretary Nicole McPherson.<\/p>\n

“Flexibility is not a perk, it’s a legal right and we’ll keep fighting to make sure every worker in finance can exercise it.”<\/p>\n

Westpac has been contacted for comment by 9news.com.au.<\/p>\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Highest-paying jobs in Australia that don’t need a degree<\/p>\n

Australian Bankers Association Simon Birmingham said working from home arrangements were best left to individual banks and their staff.<\/p>\n

“Australian banks employ around 180,000 people in a wide variety of roles.<\/p>\n

“Work from home has become a valued part of employment arrangements for banks and many of their employees but isn’t possible in all circumstances all of the time.<\/p>\n

“Flexible workplace arrangements are ideally matters for individual banks and their employees, who are best placed to together achieve outcomes that deliver the best for all parties.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"T\ufeffhe bosses of Australia’s big banks have been warned they face a flood of cases unless they reassess…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":266094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[64,63,99,164],"class_list":["post-266093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-economy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=266093"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266093\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=266093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=266093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=266093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}