Fair Work overrules employer’s objection to 100% WFH request

By Mike Toten Freelance Writer

In a decision that reinforces the view held by some that “working from home is a right, not a privilege”, the Fair Work Commission (FWC) has upheld a bank employee’s request to work from home for 100% of her work time. The FWC ruled that the bank did not meet the “reasonable business grounds” test for rejecting the employee’s request, nor did it handle the process of considering it properly.
 

Facts of case

The employee worked in the bank’s mortgage operations section and had mostly worked from home for seven years, and for the bank overall for more than 20. Her hours were part-time from 8am to 2pm five days per week. 

She moved house to a location about 65 kilometres from the bank’s Sydney Head Office. Commuting time from her children’s school to the latter was about two hours. As her partner was self-employed, worked irregular hours and often interstate, he was unable to help with picking up/dropping off their children to/from school.  

In a decision that reinforces the view held by some that “working from home is a right, not a privilege”, the Fair Work Commission (FWC) has upheld a bank employee’s request to work from home for 100% of her work time. The FWC ruled that the bank did not meet the “reasonable business grounds” test for rejecting the employee’s request, nor did it handle the process of considering it properly.
She requested a 100% work-from-home arrangement, but the bank rejected it. The rejection included the comments that “working from home is no substitute for childcare” and “your arrangements for working remotely may change at any time at [the bank’s] discretion”. The employee then offered to work at a local bank branch two days per week, but the bank replied that she would have to comply with a phased-in return to work of two days per week at Head Office. 

The FWC found that the bank had not complied with its legal obligations to discuss the request with the employee, nor genuinely tried to reach agreement with her, nor taken account of the consequences for her of refusing her request. Those factors alone sabotaged its defence. But the FWC was still required also to consider its “reasonable business grounds” defence. 

The bank’s grounds included a claimed significant loss of productivity, efficiency and customer service if some degree of “face-to-face engagement” with customers and other employees did not occur. It also mentioned team training and collaboration, and a staff messaging system that could not reach employees outside Head Office. Its rejection letter to the employee did not mention any of these grounds. The bank suggested that the “hybrid working policy” contained in its enterprise agreement effectively covered these grounds.  

However, the employee countered that face-to-face contact was not an ordinary part of her job, the team co-workers she interacted with also worked remotely, and training courses and teamwork activities were also available online. Her past performance reviews had also been very favourable over her many years of mostly working from home. Bank policy also stated that working at other branches met its minimum standards. 

The bank also argued that the employee’s choice of home and children’s school locations were simply “lifestyle choices”. Finally, it argued that the FWC could not make orders which made the terms of its enterprise agreement inconsistent with the National Employment Standards (NES). However, the FWC said that terms of an agreement could be ancillary or incidental to the NES if they were not detrimental to an employee. It added that the employee’s proposed working arrangement was not inconsistent with the terms of the enterprise agreement.  

The agreement contained provisions for the operation of hybrid working arrangements, but the employee’s request to work from home 100% was made under a different clause that allowed employees to make such requests. Therefore, an FWC order granting an employee’s request would not be inconsistent with the enterprise agreement. 

Decision 

The FWC found no evidence to support the bank’s claims regarding loss of productivity, efficiency and customer service, noting that the employee and other team members had already successfully worked remotely for many years.  It found that the financial and personal consequences of refusing the employee’s request could be substantial. The enterprise agreement in this case provided that it would not operate in any way to exclude NES entitlements. 

Overall, it found that the employee’s work could be effectively performed completely remotely. 

The FWC rejected the bank’s refusal of the employee’s request. It said it would grant an order approving the employee’s request to work 100% from home. 

What this means for employers 

The employer lost this case because, firstly, it did not comply with its legal obligation to consult with the employee and seriously consider the impact of on her of refusing her request, and then because it could not quantify the “reasonable business grounds” it relied on to reject her request. 

If an employer is going to use issues such as preserving face-to-face contact, “collaboration” and “teamwork” as its grounds, it will need to provide objective evidence that loss of them will negatively impact the business. Even then, this will have to be balanced against the potential impact on the employee – in this case, her childcare/family responsibilities and commuting time/costs. 
 

Read the judgment 

Karlene Chandler v Westpac Banking Corporation [2025] Sydney, 20 October 2025