Experts Discuss Risk of Using 3-2-2 Hybrid Working Scheme

Experts are calling to reform the Federal Labor Law as companies are evading to legally provide equipment and pay telecommunications and electricity expenses to employees under the 3-2-2 working hybrid scheme tendency, which combines remote and on-site work.

While the new COVID-19 variant Omicron is causing daily contagions exceeding a 40,000-mark, companies in Mexico are encouraged to work under the 3-2-2 hybrid model for 2022. This means that employees will work three days on-site and two at home, while resting for the remaining two. 

However, designating only a two-day home office period in a five-day workweek, allows companies to avoid legal obligations described on the Federal Labor Law’s (LFT) latest reform, as it does not exceed the 40 percent limit for the law to become applicable. 

This way, employers are avoiding their responsibilities of “providing and giving maintenance and support to the equipment needed to work, paying expenses that have to do with the employment, giving correct training to new and old employees so they can adapt and respecting working and leisure hours.”

This tendency harms the employees and follows a previous lack of compliance with the reform, debilitating further telework regulation as the legal provisions are not applicable nor enforceable. 

On the other hand, the 3-2-2 working scheme has also encouraged legal experts to call for another reform to strengthen employee rights and reduce the legal gaps in the LFT.

“There should be a reform to the latest LFT reform that establishes that with the 40 percent remote work, the employer must protect the employee. Workers are left in a limbo, where companies are no longer responsible for them and this 3-2-2 model benefits the employer more than it does the worker," said laboring specialist Manuel Fuentes.

Experts demand to stop justifying remote work as an obligation caused by COVID-19 restrictions, as this argument has been used to declare that the law is non-applicable as it was not a corporate intentional decision but rather a health emergency measure. 

Many companies have now declared that the home office or the hybrid schemes will be a permanent working model within their organizational structure due to the many benefits obtained. According to global consulting firm Bain & Company, through telework, companies can reduce between 15 and 30 percent of real estate costs.