Posted By sagalout David, the answer to your question is in your post. "we supply them with home broadband so they can synchronise at the beginning or end of the day from home." A simple work activity that you need to include in any arrangements you have. Clearly if this is all they do, then they are in a different league to those who work a standard day at home and carry out work activities with obvious risks. So to describe them as home workers would, IMHO, be stretching things a little far. You say they are field operatives, how do you cover their use of IT in 3rd party premises or on the road etc, could this be extended to cover the home bit at the front and end of the day??

Posted By sagalout David, exactly so. If existing risk assessments have identified training as one of the control measures why not? Your post read along the lines that these employees are "working outside the company premises" so you would already have systems to cover that. Therefore why not extend the system to cover the work in their homes, I would guess most if not all the controls would be the same. At the end of the day, the test for me is always-does what we have keep them as safe as we can, if so go for it and don't worry about whether it is home or away.

Posted By Tony Brunskill There is a guide on the HSE website that you will find useful. http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/leaflets.htm#h and follow link to homeworking.

Posted By JAI Home workers should be afforded the same health and safety, as they would at a fixed workplace, working at home brings other issues, with regards to the equipment who has installed the kit, is it pat tested, maintained, serviced etc, what about fire risk assessment? other issues come from the family/pets, could any damage/injury result from their tampering, stress from working extra hours just because people work from home don't forget about them Jai