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Bank of America has sent “letters of education” to employees who have not been showing up at the office, warning them of disciplinary action, in the latest move from a large company to push staff back to the workplace.
One of the messages said its recipient had failed to meet the bank’s “Workplace Excellence Guidelines” for work location “despite requests and reminders to do so”.
“Failure to follow the workplace excellence expectations applicable to your role within two weeks of the date of this notification may result in further disciplinary action,” according to the text of the letter that a BofA employee posted online.
A bank spokesperson said the text was consistent with the warning letters that have been sent, without verifying their exact contents.
Banks were among the first employers to call workers back to offices after Covid-19 altered work routines. Even so, nearly four years since companies sent workers home at the start of the pandemic, 82 per cent of large financial companies retained hybrid arrangements for most of their employees as of the end of 2023, according to the most recent data from workforce consultant Scoop.
But Jeanne Branthover, head of the global finance practice at recruiting firm DHR Global, said since the start of this year all of the banks have been stepping up enforcement of days required in the office. “Sending out these letters, that wasn’t happening before,” she said. “Once one firm says it is going to do X, then everyone is going to follow.”
JPMorgan Chase, the largest US bank by assets, last April began requiring all senior managers to be in the office five days a week, up from three. The bank declined to comment.
Citigroup last summer sent a notice to its UK employees that it would begin tracking office visits, as well as enforcing its attendance requirement, which is three days a week for nearly all employees. “We remain committed to our hybrid work model,” said a Citi spokesperson.
Goldman Sachs, which was earlier than most banks in requiring employees to return to the office in 2021, said attendance from Monday to Thursday had returned to pre-pandemic levels while it was still lower on Fridays.
Goldman recently told junior bankers that they could not expense meals if they were working from home, even if they were working late or otherwise would qualify for a meal in the office.
“We’ve returned to our normal policy for after-hours meals,” a Goldman spokesperson said.
Office attendance expectations have become more stringent as higher interest rates and a slowdown in corporate dealmaking have hurt banks’ bottom lines and prompted lay-offs. “Banks are not as worried about losing their talent as they were a year ago,” Branthover said.
BofA, Citi and UBS have initiated new rounds of job cuts in the past week. BofA’s lay-offs involve a few dozen workers and are mostly in its investment bank, according to outside recruiters and employees there.
Lay-offs at Citi and UBS are part of restructuring efforts, the former of which is looking to cut 20,000 workers by 2026. UBS is eliminating jobs as it integrates teams from the struggling Credit Suisse, which it acquired last year.
Citi, UBS and BofA declined to comment on lay-offs. BofA said it had not altered its in-office requirement, which has been three days a week for most employees since October 2022, and that the vast majority of its workers comply with attendance policies.
BofA issues letters of education to employees for a variety of workplace issues, and began using them to address office attendance concerns last autumn. Earlier this month, BofA reported that its employee turnover rate dropped to 6 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2023, about half of the bank’s typical rate.
Additional reporting by Joshua Franklin in New York
