Alphabet Inc. Chief Executive Officer Sundar Pichai during the Bloomberg Tech Conference on Wednesday, June 4, 2025 in San Francisco, California, USA.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images
google continues to impose restrictions on remote work, this time with a popular policy established during the coronavirus pandemic called “Work from Anywhere.”
This policy allowed employees to work at a location other than the company’s headquarters for up to four weeks per calendar year. According to an internal document seen by CNBC, even one day of remote work will count as a full week.
“Whether you record 1 WFA day or 5 WFA days in a given standard workweek, 1 WFA week will be deducted from your WFA week balance,” according to a document distributed over the summer just before the change went into effect.
Google is not changing its current hybrid schedule, which was also introduced during the pandemic and allows employees to work from home two days a week. WFA Day differs from that policy by giving staff the flexibility to work remotely rather than from home.
“WFA weeks may not be used for work at home or in the neighborhood,” the document reads.
Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Tech companies are increasingly forcing employees to spend more time in the office, with the peak of coronavirus infections dating back about five years. microsoft announced last month that employees will be required to work in the office three days a week starting next year, switching from a policy that allowed most employees to work from home more than 50% of the time with manager approval. Amazon went even further by directing corporate staff to spend five days a week in the office.
Google began offering voluntary buyouts to some full-time U.S. employees in early 2025, telling remote workers in multiple departments that they would be fired if they did not return to the office to work a hybrid schedule.
According to the latest changes, employees will not be able to work at a Google office in another state or country during the WFA period due to the “legal and financial implications of working cross-border.” If located in another location, the regulations state that employees may be required to work during business hours consistent with that time zone.
The WFA update does not apply to all Google staff and may exclude data center employees or employees who are required to be in a physical office. Violations of the policy will result in disciplinary action or termination, the document says.
This issue was raised at a recent all-hands meeting.
The top-rated question submitted regarding Google’s internal systems described the update as “disruptive.”
“Why does even one WFA day count as one week? Can we reconsider the restriction on using WFA weeks for telecommuting?” the question said.
According to audio obtained by CNBC, Google’s vice president of performance and compensation, John Casey, said at the meeting that the WFA “is about meeting Googlers where they’ve been during the pandemic.”
“This policy is always intended to be implemented on a weekly basis and is not intended to be used as a replacement for working from home during a typical hybrid work week,” Casey said.
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