Member Article

London businesses lose over 1.5 million working hours due to tube strikes

The recent Tube strike resulted in London businesses losing over 1.5 million working hours, according to a report commissioned by MeetingZone and conducted by Atomik Research.

In a survey from the communications and collaboration specialists, which asked 1000 London commuters found that 72 per cent of London commuters still felt employers were failing to offer better collaborative and flexible working options amidst the capital’s travel woes.

Although this week’s strikes have been called off, Londoners still face further misery if a deal isn’t reached between the Unions and London Underground managers, as a further two strikes are planned for 8 and 10 September.

The survey also found that only 9% of bosses let employees work from home during the recent tube strikes.

Furthermore, 66% of Londoners surveyed were late during the tube strikes by an average of 38 minutes each day. While nearly half of those surveyed (45%) were between 30-minutes – 1 hour late during the travel chaos.

MeetingZone’s CEO Steve Gandy said:“It’s shocking that in this day and age we’re wasting so much time trying to get into the office when we have the technology at our fingertips to make flexible working a reality,

“London businesses have already lost a total of over 1.5 million working hours during recent tube strikes, and with more planned as this dispute continues, it looks like businesses – and commuters – will have to face unnecessary travel woes.”

“Senior management need to realise the work landscape has changed and stop blocking the adoption of flexible working practices. The tube strikes in London should be the turning point for companies to start thinking about flexible working options to reduce the amount of time commuter’s waste.”

The recent strikes, part of an ongoing dispute over plans to introduce 24 hour Tube services at weekends, were the worst since 2002. The entire London Underground network came to a standstill after shutting down on 8-9 July and 5-6 August 2015.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ellen Forster .