Ecommerce major Flipkart on Wednesday has given young parents (with children studying till class 5) the option to work from home. This comes after the Karnataka government declared an indefinite holiday for children till class five. Flipkart said that the company is also checking system preparedness if they need to work remotely.
Reports stated that the company directed all its employees at its Bengaluru campus, located in Bellandur, to work from home for three days, as a precautionary measure due to coronavirus. It is important to note that so far, there are no known cases of coronavirus at Flipkart. This is unlike PayTM, where a case was reported in Delhi.
“The company has issued a ban on all non-essential domestic and international business travel and we are encouraging employees who may have returned from international travel to work from home for 14 days,” Flipkart said in a statement.
“We are promoting the use of video conferences for meetings, including job interviews, and are temporarily avoiding events and training programs that require large gatherings as a precautionary measure,” it added.
Flipkart said that they have organised awareness sessions for employees, and field executives are given the required tools and are keeping track of impacted areas. “Wishmasters [field executives] who are unwell are being advised to rest with all assurance of medical support,” the company said.
Flipkart reportedly has 8,000-10,000 employees in Bengaluru. In addition to this, payments arm PhonePe will also be following suit soon, and 50-60% of its staff too will be working from home from Thursday onwards, reported ET.
One employee of Dell and Mindtree in Bengaluru have both tested positive for coronavirus. Both of them had travel history. While the Dell employee returned from Austin, Texas via Dubai, the Mindtree employee returned from the US via London. Dell employees in that particular office were told to work from home for a period of 14 days as the 46-year-old man, who later tested positive for coronavirus, had gone to the office for two days. His wife and 13-year-old daughter have also tested positive for the virus and are undergoing treatment. The Mindtree employee did not go to work following his travel. His family has been quarantined as a precautionary measure.
The Karnataka government has told IT companies to refrain from sending their employees abroad. “Thousands of people come in from all over the world to Bengaluru since as we know Bengaluru is an IT hub. We will be telling IT companies to not send their employees on-site till this is resolved,” Karnataka’s Medical Education Minister Dr Sudhakar told TNM earlier.