New Ways of Working

Mexico passed a reform to the Federal Labor Law (FLL) concerning teleworking (remote working) in January 2021. According to the FLL, remote working applies under the following conditions: (i) employees’ services are not required in the employer's facilities; (ii) employees constantly provide their services outside of the employer's facilities; (iii) employees carry out more than 40% of their work outside of the office; and (iv) technology is used for the administration of the labour relationship and supervision of the performed services.

The Mexican legislation on remote working, however, does not exclude or limit the possibility of remote working for employees based on their position; this scheme may be negotiated by an employer with its employees through an agreement.

“Gig” workers and independent contractors are treated equally and not considered employees, so telework guidelines do not apply to their services. However, if the service provider files a lawsuit before the Labour Board claiming the existence of an employment relationship, the beneficiary of the services must prove that the service provider was not under his control, supervision, or exclusive dependence.

The Portuguese Labour Code established the legal regime for remote working, in particular teleworking, in 2003. This provided employers with a general framework for this kind of arrangement. During the covid-19 pandemic and its successive lockdowns, a vast array of legislation on telework was issued, given the specificity of the situation.

Back in March 2020, the teleworking regime could be unilaterally imposed by an employer or requested by employees, without the need for an agreement of the parties provided that it was compatible with the employees’ functions. Independent contractors were excluded from the scope of this regime.

Due to the evolution of the pandemic, it was then determined that teleworking should be mandatory, regardless of the employment relationship (including contractors), whenever employees’ functions allowed it. In this context, measures were also adopted to promote the compulsory implementation of teleworking within the scope of civil servants, whenever this was compatible with the functions being performed.

With the reduction in the number of covid-19 cases, in summer 2020 teleworking was no longer mandatory and the legal regime foreseen in the Portuguese Labour Code was solely applicable.

However, the increase of covid-19 infections led to the adoption of new measures in October 2020, which determined the promotion of teleworking whenever the nature of the activity allowed it. Considering the number of outbreaks, it quickly evolved to a point when teleworking became mandatory in the regions with a higher risk of infection.

It was only in November 2020 that teleworking was established as mandatory for companies that were the final users or beneficiaries of services provided by independent contractors, service providers and temporary employees.

After Christmas 2020 and with the new lockdown, teleworking once again became mandatory across the country. Despite a government announcement in March 2021 that teleworking would be mandatory until the end of the year, due to the success of the national vaccination programme teleworking ceased to be mandatory from 1 August 2021.

Council of Ministers Resolution No.181-A/2021 decreed mandatory teleworking between 25 December 2021 and 9 January 2022, which was then extended until 14 January 2022.

Other than this period of mandatory teleworking, at the end of 2021 Law No. 83/2021 was passed, which entered into force on 1 January 2022. This law modified the teleworking regime, introducing several changes to the Labour Code and to Law 98/2009 on work accidents and occupational diseases.

This new law states that provisions on equipment and systems; organisation, direction, and control of work; special obligations; privacy; and health and safety at work apply to all situations of remote work without legal subordination, but with economic dependence. The extension and scope of such obligations are unclear, but it is doubtful that this new teleworking regime was intended to accommodate “gig economy” workers and other independent contractors. It is more likely to have a residual character, to prevent situations where it is unclear if one is dealing with an employment contract or a service provision (eg, home workers), as this may change crucial rules on privacy or health and safety.

Security controls

The common risks associated with remote working derive from the absence of security controls over equipment, software, and data, and not having any policies for remote-working schemes, leading to:

• employees storing sensitive information in their local machines, without the control of employers over such tools;
• compromised security controls; and
• Wi-Fi networks and routers in homes are more easily compromised, increasing the risk of exposure.

Companies have the right to install security controls for the equipment and tools to be used by teleworkers to avoid any leaks of information and limit their use, because this hardware is the property of the employer. The common practice in Mexico is to implement a security data policy and a work tools policy.

Additionally, even though there are no specific legal provisions concerning the plausible risks associated with data protection in remote-working schemes, the Federal Law for the Protection of Personal Data in Possession of Private Individuals or Entities, the Federal Law for the Protection of Industrial Property, and their regulations and guidelines, establish provisions for the protection of rights concerning personal data, confidential information, and trade secrets, which also apply to remote-working schemes; therefore, all employees working remotely must comply with these laws and regulations. To prevent and avoid the disclosure of this information, the prevailing practice is to enter into agreements with employees establishing specific obligations in connection to confidentiality and data privacy. Such obligations usually refer to the policies and processes established by employers to ensure information security, and the corresponding penalties in the event of any breach.

Until the pandemic, teleworking was used rather infrequently, and most Portuguese employers were not prepared – namely in terms of technology and data storage – to suddenly have their workforce almost entirely and permanently working from home or remotely.

For those reasons, teleworking mainly raised – and continues to raise – concerns regarding the employer’s capacity to ensure that information is protected and that it stays confidential despite being remotely accessed and processed. Remote working enhances security vulnerabilities, which can lead to data breaches.

We would also like to highlight the use of technological solutions that, on one hand, allow employers to exercise their powers of management and control over work performance, but that, on the other, do not violate the general rule prohibiting the use of remote surveillance to control employees' professional performances, or that do not cause excessive restrictions on employees’ private lives.

According to article 330-I of the amended FLL; the mechanisms employed to monitor teleworkers must be proportional to their purpose; employers must always guarantee the employees’ right to privacy; and the legal framework for protecting personal data must be complied with.

Additionally, activity monitoring must be limited to employees’ working hours and digital connectivity, be transparent, and the employer must respect the employees’ right to disconnect, meaning that they need to respect employees’ time off and must never expect their availability outside of working hours. Further, webcams are not mandatory, and employees have the right to refuse to turn them on.

In terms of privacy, the teleworking regime establishes that employers must respect employees’ privacy and time with their families, as well as provide them with good working conditions, both physically and psychologically. This was made even clearer with the new teleworking law.

Whenever remote working is carried out at an employee's home, visiting the workplace should only be necessary to check work performance or equipment and can only take place during the employees’ working hours, in the presence of the employee or a person designated by the employee, with prior notice of at least 24 hours and the employee’s consent.

Regarding limits on employers monitoring employee activity, the Portuguese Labour Code prohibits the use of remote surveillance in the workplace to monitor the professional performance of employees.

Especially during the pandemic, when remote working and teleworking, in particular, were normalised, concerns arose regarding the limits of monitoring and how to adequately safeguard employees’ privacy.

On 17 April 2020, the National Data Protection Commission (CNPD) issued guidelines on remote control during teleworking, especially the need for monitoring working time and the fact that, in several companies, employees were using their own devices to work.

In these guidelines, the National Data Protection Commission clarified that, regardless of who owns the work equipment, under the teleworking regime employers retain powers to direct and control the execution of work by employees. However, since there are no special provisions on remote control during teleworking, the National Data Protection Commission believes that the general rule prohibiting the use of remote surveillance fully applies.

Therefore, technological solutions for remote monitoring of employee performance are not allowed. For example, software that, in addition to tracking working times, records websites visited; tracks equipment locations in real-time; monitors the use of peripheral devices; captures screenshots; records when access to applications is initiated; controls the document being worked on; or records the time spent on each task are all prohibited.

Please note that, during the pandemic, when remote working was most widespread, the National Data Protection Commission and Trade Unions reported a significant increase in employees’ complaints about illegal monitoring taking place.

Also, since Portuguese labour law imposes an obligation to register working time (eg, start, pauses, end of work time), in teleworking this can be done through technological solutions. Applications specially designed for this purpose are allowed provided data protection principles are respected.

Concerns regarding these technological solutions were partially addressed by the new teleworking law, which states that when controlling the performance, the employer must respect the principles of proportionality and transparency, notably the employer cannot impose a permanent connection on employees through image or sound.  Also, it is forbidden to capture and use images, sound, keystrokes, browsing history, or other information that may affect the employee's right to privacy.

Yes, employers must provide, install, and maintain the necessary supplies and equipment (for example, computers, ergonomic chairs, and printers); pay any expenses arising from teleworking, such as internet, communication and electricity services; keep a registry of the supplies delivered to the teleworkers in compliance with workplace health and safety provisions; and establish the necessary training and advisory mechanisms to guarantee the adoption and adequate use of information technology.

Yes, under the new teleworking law employers are responsible for providing employees with the equipment and systems required for the performance of their work and employee-employer interaction. The teleworking agreement must indicate whether such equipment is directly provided by the employer or acquired by the employee with the employer’s approval regarding its characteristics and prices.

Furthermore, employers may define the usage conditions of the equipment in the teleworking agreement or the company's internal regulations; if the employer does not, it is assumed that there are no limits to the use of such equipment.

As mentioned above, under the general provisions on teleworking, employers should pay any extra costs related to teleworking. As specified by the new teleworking law, employers will fully reimburse all additional expenses that the employee incurs as a direct consequence of acquiring or using the equipment and computer or telematics systems necessary for the performance of the work, which includes any additional energy and internet costs, as well as the maintenance costs of the equipment and systems. Such reimbursement is considered, for tax purposes, a cost for employers and does not constitute income for employees.

If employees are hired under Mexican law, they will be entitled to the same mandatory benefits and social security as any other employee in Mexico; therefore, they must be registered with the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS) and must comply with employment tax obligations, which include payroll taxes and income tax on their salaries.

The analysis of potential issues associated with cross-border remote working depend on whether employees are working in Portugal or abroad and if there are one or multiple employers involved and where they are located.

However, cross-border remote-working arrangements mainly raise issues regarding the definition of applicable law. The correct definition of the applicable law allows for compliance with labour and social security obligations that otherwise, if breached, pose significant risks to employers.

Even if there is an agreement through which the parties choose the applicable law, a set of mandatory provisions of Portuguese labour law would still apply if the work is mainly performed in Portugal, namely in key areas such as termination, health and safety obligations, and insurance for workplace accidents. Failure to correctly identify the applicable law may have serious consequences, for instance, employers may be entirely and solely responsible for all liabilities deriving from a work accident.

Furthermore, if in a given case the Portuguese labour law applies to the cross-border remote-working agreement, employers have to bear in mind that there are some difficulties regarding the definition of workplace and work time in connection with remote working, which can raise challenges when implementing these schemes.

Besides the above, cross-border remote working may also raise questions regarding work permits.

No, any reductions to employees’ salaries or benefits are considered a unilateral modification to employment conditions, and therefore are grounds for justified rescission of the employment contract with total responsibility attributed to the employer. If this were to happen, severance will have to be paid as if it were an unjustified dismissal.

Teleworking employees have the same rights and obligations as any other employees, which implies that no reduction in salaries or benefits is admissible, in principle. Under Portuguese labour law, employers cannot reduce basic remuneration unless expressly and exceptionally authorised by both the employee and the Authority for Working Conditions (ACT).

Reducing or cancelling any other payments to remote workers would be deemed discriminatory, and therefore illegal, except for situations where valid grounds could justify it.

Moreover, concerning reducing or suppressing benefits, the fact that benefits have been granted regularly over the years may lead to their qualification as acquired rights of the employees and part of employees’ remuneration, which would mean restrictions on the termination, reduction or alteration of such payments.

During the beginning of the covid-19 pandemic, there was debate over whether employees were still entitled to a meal allowance if they were teleworking, since the cause for payment would cease to exist (ie, employees would no longer be forced to spend money on out-of-home meals). However, the government clarified that, under the special compulsory teleworking regime (whenever the nature of the functions being performed was compatible with it), employees retain the right to a meal allowance, based on the principle of equal rights for on-site employees and teleworkers. It is now fairly and widely accepted that such meal allowances cannot be withdrawn based on the circumstances of teleworking employees.

The Mexican authorities have issued guidelines and general provisions for the reopening of workplaces during the pandemic. Employers must issue and implement an emergency plan within the workplace to prevent the transmission of covid-19.

The workplace emergency plan must include provisions to guide, train, and instruct employees to prevent and control the transmission of covid-19, which must include the following matters: 

• promoting health: employees and employers must frequently wash their hands with water and soap or use antibacterial gel; cover their nose and mouth; not cough, sneeze, or spit without covering their mouths; not touch their face with dirty hands; clean and disinfect tools, seats, tables, and facilities;  and ventilate and allow the passage of sunlight. Furthermore, employers must provide their employees with sanitary products and equipment; assign work shifts in a fashion that reduces contact between employees; and verify that working stations have at least 1.5 or 2 metres between them;
• encourage the maintenance of 1.5 metres between employees;
• entrance and exit control with the measurement of employees' temperatures;
• stay at home if required by federal or local authorities; and
• stay at home if experiencing any COVID-19 symptoms.

Additionally, a company representative must be appointed as the person responsible for informing all employees of orders issued by the relevant health authorities. Employers must identify: employees who are vulnerable to covid-19; work and duties that may be carried out outside the workplace; functions that may lead to a higher risk of infection; and essential activities that may continue at the workplace. Employers must prepare employees to carry out activities and use technologies if a remote-working scheme is implemented, and provide them with the necessary tools.

Employers must place information regarding covid-19, such as symptoms, preventive measures, and general provisions, in a visible location within the workplace. Furthermore, they must also provide their employees with emergency telephone numbers in case of infection.

Yes, employers must protect the health and safety of employees; adopt health and safety measures that arise from the law or collective bargaining agreements in the workplace; and provide employees with information and training to prevent work accidents or illness. Besides these general obligations in the Portuguese Labour Code, there are also specific obligations imposed on employers to prevent the spread of covid-19.

The ACT released a set of recommendations to employers to adapt workplaces and protect employees during the covid-19 pandemic. It is recommended that employers consider measures such as staggering schedules as much as possible, redistributing tasks, teleworking, employee rotation or setting different break times if the workspace does not allow for social distancing.

Furthermore, according to the ACT, it is important that indoor workplaces are ventilated, preferably by strengthening natural ventilation, and that the maintenance and cleaning of ventilation and air conditioning systems are guaranteed. Employers should also ensure, whenever necessary and possible, that the layout of workstations is changed to maintain social distancing and reduce contact between employees. If this is not possible, the ACT recommends creating a physical barrier between employees using, for example, partitions.

Employers must also ensure that employees have access to personal protective equipment to prevent occupational risks. Moreover, employers must maintain an updated contingency plan.

Employers are not authorised to mandate or demand employees to receive a covid-19 vaccination. If an employee refuses the covid-19 vaccine, their employer may not terminate their employment contract or impose any other sanction. However, employers may implement preventive measures according to the provisions for the reopening of workplaces, which employees must comply with. If an employee does not comply with such preventive measures or policies, their employer can terminate the employment contract with justifiable cause. It is important to mention that the employer must have abundant evidence of a policy breach by the employee for the termination to be justifiable if a lawsuit were to be filed by a dismissed employee.

No, vaccination against covid-19 is not compulsory in Portugal, not even for so-called risk groups such as medical personnel or social workers. For the time being, employers cannot force employees to be vaccinated or ask them to provide information on their vaccination status; they can only recommend vaccination. Without the Portuguese parliament passing a law making vaccination compulsory, no private or public entity can force its employees to get vaccinated.

Furthermore, to implement a compulsory policy, employers would most likely have to obtain vaccination certificates from their employees, which would be unlawful under the Portuguese labour law.

Entry to the workplace could be conditioned on receiving a Covid-19 vaccination as a health and safety measure to prevent the spread of the virus. However, since vaccination is not mandatory, employees who have decided not to get vaccinated have the right to remain active and continue providing services at the employer’s premises or remotely without changes to their employment conditions.

Employers cannot require employees to provide information regarding their health – namely but not exclusively regarding their vaccination – except when it is strictly necessary and relevant to assess their suitability for work and the stated purpose is provided in writing to employees. Please note that even in such cases, health data would be provided to the occupational doctor – ie, not directly to the employer – who in turn can only communicate to the company an employee's fitness to perform their role.

Therefore, it is unlawful to make entry to the workplace conditional on employees having an optional vaccine such as covid-19, both from a labour and a data protection perspective. Such behaviour can be deemed a very serious breach of labour laws, leading to penalties, orders to cease such conduct, and damages under general civil law principles.

No, the government has released a covid-19 FAQ where they clarify that vaccination is not mandatory.

No, there are not.

Under the Federal Law for the Protection of Personal Data in Possession of Private Individuals or Entities, employers may obtain and treat employees’ personal data without having to obtain consent if such information is required for compliance with employers’ and employees’ obligations. As employers are obliged to implement all necessary measures to prevent workplace accidents and disease outbreaks, we believe that employers are entitled to gather and process such information, if required, to comply with these obligations. Employers must always treat this information and data as confidential.

Notwithstanding the above, employers must provide or make available to employees the data privacy notice through which it is established that their data, including but not limited to health information, may be gathered and processed to comply with the obligations derived from the employment relationship.

See question 9.

In addition to the aforementioned rules for processing employee’s health data, from a personal data perspective, the processing of special categories of data (vaccination data qualifies as health data) is generally forbidden unless one of the exceptions foreseen in article 9 (2) of GDPR applies. Therefore, this processing would only be lawful if this data is necessary for preventive or occupational medicine or for assessing the working capacity of the employee.

The 2019 reform on teleworking provides for specific protection to ensure workers' health and safety rights. A Mexican Official Standard Regulation (NOM) must be published within 18 months of the enactment of the Reform; however, the authorities have not issued any additional provisions yet.

The only current and relevant obligation for employers with remote workers related to health and safety is to register their employees at the IMSS. Registration with the IMSS ensures standard health and safety protection, such as the applicable framework for other workers. Further, employers must guarantee a safe working environment, and provide adequate equipment to render services. Nevertheless, executing a written agreement with remote employees stating their sole and individual responsibility for ensuring that they are fulfilling their work duties in a safe environment has become standard practice.

According to the Portuguese Labour Code, teleworking employees have the same rights and duties as other employees, namely concerning working conditions, health and safety, and medical care arising from work accidents or occupational illnesses. Employers must also be mindful of the isolation of remote employees by ensuring regular contact with the company and other employees.

Employers are responsible for the identification and management of risks in teleworking and on-site work alike. When addressing the health and safety risks of remote working, employers must pay particular attention to psychosocial risks and ergonomic factors.

Employers must organise, in specific and adequate terms, and with respect for employee privacy, the means necessary to fulfil their responsibilities regarding health and safety at work. Employers must provide employees with good working conditions both physically and psychologically; and carry out occupational health examinations before the implementation of the teleworking policy, and annual examinations thereafter to assess the physical and mental aptitude of employees to perform their work, the impact of the activity and the conditions in which it is provided on their health, as well as any preventive measures that may be appropriate.

Employees must give access to the place they telework to professionals designated by their employer to evaluate and control the health and safety conditions at work, at a previously agreed time, between 9am and 7pm, and within the employee’s working hours.

Employers must also keep insurance companies informed of the specific workplace of remote or teleworking, to ensure that their policy will cover any work accident that might occur.

No additional employer obligations concerning health and safety beyond the physical workplace have emerged as a consequence of the pandemic, except for the requirement that employers who conduct non-essential activities carry out their operations remotely.

Before the pandemic, teleworking and remote working were rather infrequent, hence there was little guidance on what specifications should be considered in terms of health and safety at work when employees were not onsite.

With teleworking became mandatory during a large part of the pandemic, employers had to consider many new health and safety challenges: particular attention was paid to equipment and conditions at home, with many companies paying for office chairs, monitors and other tools compatible with ergonomic standards. Also, due to the isolation and stress of successive lockdowns, employers enhanced their focus on mental health and well-being.

In terms of legal discussion, there was a significant debate around work accidents when employees are working remotely, due to the lack of specific provisions in the law.

With the new teleworking law, it was clarified that the legal policy for compensation for accidents at work and occupational illnesses applies to teleworking. The law considers the relevant ‘workplace’ to be the one chosen by employees to usually carry out their activities and ‘working time’ as all time during which, demonstrably, employees are working.

Regarding health and safety obligations, no distinction exists to date between mobile workers and workers based primarily at home.

As far as Portuguese labour law applies to employment relations, health and safety obligations on employers are the same for employees working on-site, from home, remotely, or “mobile” employees, with the latter understood to be employees working in more than one place or travelling frequently as part of their job.

What differs is the evaluation of health and safety risks according to the specific circumstances of each employee (ie, even though the employers’ obligations are the same irrespective of the type of employee, the assessment and specific measures to be applied to ensure compliance will vary in accordance with the way each job is performed).

Specifically, NOM-035 sets forth the necessary mechanism for employees to prevent psychosocial risk factors in the workplace, promote a healthy working environment, and how to evaluate their compliance. NOM-035 must be implemented regarding both mobile workers and workers based primarily at home.

According to the Portuguese Labour Code, employers must provide good working conditions, both physical and mental. Health obligations should be understood holistically, encompassing both mental and physical health and wellbeing. Since these obligations apply to employers regardless of the type of employment relationship, they will also include teleworking and remote-working employees.

In practical terms, this implies that, when the health and safety services assess risks, they will identify and analyse those specific to the circumstance of not working onsite, such as stress, fatigue or sedentariness.

Yes, employees have a "right to disconnect" as outlined in the Reform; however, this right is subject to the working hours established in their contracts and the limits established by the FLL. As set out by the FLL, employees must not work more than 48 hours a week, which can be distributed as agreed upon in their employment conditions. Furthermore, employees are entitled to a break period, which must be at least 30 minutes long during their work shift.

With this new law on teleworking, the “right to disconnect” is now expressly established in the Portuguese Labour Code.

Therefore, employers must not contact employees in their rest period, except in cases of force majeure. Moreover, it is considered discriminatory to treat less favourably any employee that exercises their right to not be contacted during a rest period.

Notwithstanding this, such a right already be derived, namely from the duty – already expressly established in the Portuguese Labour Code – of the employer to respect employees’ privacy and rest times and of the limits on daily and weekly working hours (ie, based on a combination of several rules, namely labour and constitutional, employees already had a “right to disconnect”, both while onsite or working remotely).

The federal government have reinforced the protective labour laws that prohibit redundancies and salary reduction as a general rule, stating that that the pandemic would not give legal cause for suspension of employment or dismissal. However, many employers managed to negotiate directly with unions or employees and introduced reduced temporary terms and conditions of employment that enabled companies to remain in business.

During the pandemic, the government created a special and simplified lay-off system, aimed at maintaining jobs in companies that were totally or partially closed due to the imposition of the law. Under this system, employers could, in short, reduce the normal working time (daily or weekly) or suspend employment contracts.

Within this system, employers could reduce remuneration within certain limits: employees could earn at least two-thirds of their regular monthly remuneration, with a minimum amount of 635 euro in 2020 and 665 euro in 2021 and a maximum limit of 1,905.00 euro in 2020 and 1,995.00 euro in 2021.

Payments to employees were made by the employer, who received aid from Social Security corresponding to 70% of the costs. Employers were also exempt from social security contributions regarding employees under the simplified lay-off regime.

Other measures allowed for the reduction of salaries, namely extraordinary support for the progressive resumption of activity for companies with a temporary reduction of normal working times, which applied to companies not subject to facility closures, but that still had losses of 25% or more in a calendar month prior to the calendar month of the initial application or extension, compared with the same month of the previous year or 2019, or compared with the six-month average prior to that period.

Regarding the hours not worked under this scheme, employees were entitled to compensation of 80% of their gross pay paid by employers. If this sum represented a monthly amount lower than the employee's normal gross pay, the amount paid by Social Security would increase to cover the difference, capped at 1,995 euro.

Seventy per cent of the said compensation was borne by Social Security, with the employer responsible for the remaining 30%. Where the reduction in working time was more than 60%, Social Security support corresponded to 100% of compensation.

Please note that accessing these and other state support measures – not only labour and social security-based relief, but also some tax measures and tenancy benefits – meant employers could not terminate employment contracts based on collective or individual dismissal during the period they availed of said benefit and within 60 or 90 days after its end. Some support measures also forced employers to maintain current employment levels, and also limited, among other things, the right to terminate employment contracts by agreement (ie, in such cases, employers would have to repay the benefit that they were granted, either partially or entirely, depending on the situation).

The unions have remained pro-business during the pandemic and have been flexible with the modification of working schedules, temporary stoppages, reduced terms and conditions of employment and avoidance of strikes. The pandemic regulations allowed the most important economic activities to continue during the crucial stages of the pandemic, and unions agreed to implement immediate teleworking schemes. Many of the provisions of the 2021 reform on teleworking were developed in practice by employers and union representatives during negotiations.  

Until the pandemic, unions in Portugal were not particularly focused on remote-working and teleworking employees or their working conditions and rights.

Nevertheless, during the pandemic, unions played an important role in shaping the contours and content of the special teleworking regime, namely through pressuring the government to address or clarify some key issues, such as the payment of meal allowances and other expenses to teleworking employees, but also to report some misconduct, such as illegal monitoring of teleworking employees.

Employers did not give unions a particularly relevant role in the adoption of covid-19 measures; the simplified lay-off regime meant there was a duty to consult with trade union delegates and workers’ councils, when applicable, but not to negotiate with the unions.

By legal definition, teleworking must be included in the respective collective bargaining agreement (CBA). The terms and conditions of the CBA for teleworkers shall include all the relevant and special conditions of the services. Teleworkers enjoy equal rights when compared to those applicable to standard employees, including training, salary, health, social security and the right to remain employed. The implementation of teleworking is voluntary and must be agreed in writing; therefore, it is negotiated by unions. However, teleworking can be unilaterally determined by the employer in the presence of force majeure that impedes the continuity of standard services.  

No, this level of intervention regarding remote-working and telework arrangements is not available to unions.

At the most, unions can ask for information on general teleworking regimes that employers may wish to agree with employees under the general guidelines of the Portuguese Labour Code, since unions are entitled to be informed about decisions that are likely to trigger substantial changes in the organisation of work or employment contracts.

Nonetheless, please note that collective bargaining agreements may introduce specific terms regarding teleworking and remote-working regimes.