As concerned
employees in IT and BPO companies, we appeal to the government to suspend the Return-To-Office
(RTO) on April 1. Dapat balik trabahong ligtas para sa BPO workers. Mandating
the return to office of 1.4 million IT and BPO workers on the sole basis of
economic and tax reasons disregards the issue of health and safety of
employees.
The RTO is a
recipe for disaster. It is an “April
Fools’ prank” that endangers occupational safety and health, and work-life
balance.
We support the Change.org
petition of the groups BPO Employees for Leni-Kiko and IT&BPO Professionals
for Leni and Kiko opposing the return to office order by the Fiscal Incentives
Review Board (FIRB) of the Department of Finance (DoF). The FIRB cited the
CREATE Law that provides that BPO as economic zones must “exclusively conducted
or operated within the geographical boundaries of the zone or freeport.”
In contrast to
the FIRB and DoF position, we believe that safety committees, with employee
representation, are in the best position to evaluate safety in our
workplaces and recommend a safe full RTO or to maintain the present hybrid
setup—not a government that ignores real-life conditions.
Even before the
pandemic, if one BPO employee gets a cough or cold, in a day or two, someone
else will show similar symptoms due to infection. Headsets too are sometimes
shared among employees and are another way by which COVID-19 might be easily
transmitted in a 100% fully operational scenario.
Alternatives to a
full RTO by April 1 can be considered such as 50 to 75% of BPO workers returning
to the office and implementing a compressed work week while maintaining the work
from home or anywhere for the rest of the week.
The Philippines
subscribes to the principle of tripartism and social dialogue and yet the return
to office order was without the benefit of consultation and discussion with BPO
workers. We ask Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello to initiate a tripartite social
dialogue, that must include representatives of BPO workers, to come up with an
acceptable solution to the return to office in BPOs. ###
The Inter-Call
Center Association of Workers (ICCAW) is a DOLE-registered workers’ association
that was formed in 2012 out of the struggle of 667 employees of a call center
in Cebu City which unceremoniously closed down.
Press Statement
March 27, 2022
Inter-Call Center Association of Workers
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