eracode: A little off topic but related: I have often wondered about the situation where employees who do large amounts of international business travel are able to rack up huge volumes of Air Points Dollars and then use them to take expensive overseas personal holidays with their spouse/partner with 'free' airfares. The APD's are paid for by the employer and used tax-free by the employee. Often the original business travel is done in Business Class which generates high levels of APD's. My understanding is that all this does not attract Fringe Benefit Tax and I could never figure out why.

old3eyes: I guess soon the IRD will want all telco to supply itemized cell fone accounts so that employers can ask their staff to go thru them and mark what are personal calls and what are business. You'll then be expected to pay for the personal calls.

I've seen this in one company I worked at with normal fone calls.

NonprayingMantis:

old3eyes: I guess soon the IRD will want all telco to supply itemized cell fone accounts so that employers can ask their staff to go thru them and mark what are personal calls and what are business. You'll then be expected to pay for the personal calls.

I've seen this in one company I worked at with normal fone calls.

When I worked in an accounting dept in the uk at a large legal firm this exact thing happened. At that point many years ago only the top brass had phones, so you had the ridiculous situation of these high flyers taking probably 100 quid or more worth of billable hours out of their day to go over a phone bill and highlight 5 quids worth of personal calls, then going down to the accounts department and handing over the cash to the accounts receivable guy (me). Absurd.

sleemanj: It's a ridiculous idea.

There is already FBT which is silly enough in itself if you ask me.

If they start going down that road, then people would be quite justified in wanting to claim expenses for their personal things which might sometimes be used in the course of doing business, then we descend into the maze like taxation systems that other countries have.

When it comes to tax, K.I.S.S! Complicated regimes just lead to less compliance.

NonprayingMantis:

old3eyes: I guess soon the IRD will want all telco to supply itemized cell fone accounts so that employers can ask their staff to go thru them and mark what are personal calls and what are business. You'll then be expected to pay for the personal calls.

I've seen this in one company I worked at with normal fone calls.

When I worked in an accounting dept in the uk at a large legal firm this exact thing happened. At that point many years ago only the top brass had phones, so you had the ridiculous situation of these high flyers taking probably 100 quid or more worth of billable hours out of their day to go over a phone bill and highlight 5 quids worth of personal calls, then going down to the accounts department and handing over the cash to the accounts receivable guy (me). Absurd.

surfisup1000:

sleemanj: It's a ridiculous idea.

There is already FBT which is silly enough in itself if you ask me.

If they start going down that road, then people would be quite justified in wanting to claim expenses for their personal things which might sometimes be used in the course of doing business, then we descend into the maze like taxation systems that other countries have.

When it comes to tax, K.I.S.S! Complicated regimes just lead to less compliance.

I've heard it commented that the US can just about catch anyone out on tax matters due to their system being so hideously complex. 

JimmyH:
It was like that at my old employer, and we had to pay if it was over $5 for the month. While I have had to carry a work phone for most of the last 18 years (don't at the moment), I always carry a personal one as well and use it for all personal calls. It's just much less hassle.

networkn:

Klipspringer:

ubergeeknz:

Klipspringer:

floydbloke: Flexible hours, telecommuting/working from home and on the road are all here and here to stay.

Not if you working for Yahoo

And CEOs of companies which are actually successful are saying they're doing the complete wrong thing...

I don't know. Part of me agrees with Marissa Mayer.
From my experience, people working from home tend to slack off quiet conciderably. We use to allow it, but now we allow it on a case by case bases only.

Back to topic ...

This! We see so many employment issues as IT Providers, for workers who work from home. Complications all over the place. 

Best Buy, in the midst of a corporate restructuring, has canceled its flexible work program and expects corporate employees to put in traditional 40-hour work weeks at the retailer's headquarters in Richfield, Minn.