legal problem [can my employer force me to buy a laptop?]

Visas, Permits, Passports and Naturalization
41
I don't really know how it works. You can't opt to file a tax return even if you earn a lower wage? I was told you could write off a load of stuff like travel, work meals etc. That's only available to high earners?

42

well you can, but unless your super smart you'll need an accountant to sort out what you can and can't claim, and for the money they charge you would be lucky to make it back on a rebate.

43
Mm, I see your point, but I reckon it's a matter of custom more than principle.

For instance, if your workplace requires a suit you're expected to provide your own suit - fair enough - but if your job requires some other sartorial gear, say a hazmat overall or a dayglo orange vest, you're not expected to buy that yourself. No difference whatsoever in principle, it's just a question of what's customary in a given trade.

44
Not necessarily. I got a very nice exit package from one Swiss employer. It's not unfair dismissal that you get them on, it's breach of contract , which is taken very seriously here. I suppose it could be argued that not supplying the tools to do ones job is a breach of contract. But if you're considering legal approaches, then you can count the job as over. Further, any compensation you get will be limited to the damage you suffered. In my case, I could not have expected more than one year's salary, if it had gone to court.

You might expect that, but I wouldn't. (except for the suit and tie, but even then, I've not worn either for over five years). When you arrive at work as an employee or even as an external, one of the first places your normally shown on arrival, is the stationary cupboard, where you get kitted out with pens, pads etc.

Of the 14 clients/employees I've had over the past 20 years, only one hasn't provided stationary and only one has permitted (actually required) use of your own laptop. And in both cases, that applied only to externals.

Under UK law, if the clothing can reasonably be expected to be worn outside of the workplace, it isn't claimable. The boundaries are a source of endless fun for tax officials and tax lawyers.

45
You've come for your first day in your new job as a bus driver, have you?

Where's your bus? You did remember to buy one, didn't you?

46
Without the smart sweater.

47
UK tax law has absolutely nothing to do with Swiss tax law.

48
I totally agree with you and absolutely see the distinction between a suit and tie, and a hazmat overall. It would be crazy to expect a teacher to purchase a specialist piece of kit for 600chfs. However, there is a line here and I'm not sure where a laptop falls - it's 2010 and more and more of us in unrelated professions are expected to be IT literate, expected to be able to continue our work at home on a PC, and perhaps expected to own a laptop? Of course, just springing it on a teacher is really unfair, but if given a number of months, or even a year notice, is it really unreasonable to expect an employee to own a laptop? I don't know.

49

of course its unreasonble, because it wouldn't really be there laptop, it would need to have the schools software installed, which is in itself a legal nightmare because of the software licence. Then what happens if the schools power somehow fries your pc? or you bring in a virus, or someone steals it from school? or from your home when its got confidential school info on it? Or you want to take it on holiday, opps you can't as it has swiss data on etc etc Its a total legal nightmare, your opening yourself and the school upto a whole load of trouble.

50
Expecting a teacher to be IT literate enough to sort out home broadband and have a PC at home is one thing, expecting them to have a laptop and to use that at work, to interface with the school's recording systems etc is another.

I think the first is a reasonable request and the second not. However, maybe it's a generation thing - I'm of the age where I still think laptops are cool marvels of technology!

51
Yeah, OK I agree from that point of view. I just thought it would be one piece of software on it to access the smart boards, and I don't know what confidential information a teacher has access to, and in any case how that data would be less safe in a laptop rather than a pile of paperwork. If the school fries the laptop, they pay and they arranged a locked room or lockers and/or insurance for the laptops.

52
But it doesn't really matter what brand of suit you wear, or how many pockets it has. Imagine if your new employer demanded you only wore tailor made suits from saville row, or that you had to make it yourself. Or that it's pockets had to be a certain dimension and not be older than 2 years, it must be 100% cotton, or 100% nylon. What if he declared your suit to be unsuitable because it didn't match the office furniture.

53
Or how about if you have to wear a plain dark tie, dark suit, black shoes, black socks, double cuff white shirt with no breast pocket, plain cufflinks, clean shaven, no visible tattoos or piercings, conservative haircut.... I've worked in a number of places with a more detailed dress spec than that.

54

Student reports / records are considered confidential. If the school wont pay for the equipment do you think they would pay to fix someone elses?

copying files to / from a pc is easier then copying papers

55
At the end of the day though.... OP, what did it say in the contract that you signed? Or are they trying to force you to sign a new contract?

56
Funeral parlour?

57
You're not wrong there - in fact, I don't think I know any teacher who hasn't got a computer and internet access at home. It would be pretty tough to do the job these days without one.

But I'd be a bit miffed if my boss expected me to bring my home computer into work - photos, personal files, dodgy web history and all - or, even worse, cough up for a new computer just so I could access some fancypants school register system.

58
There's something else I've just thought of which is, perhaps, more important than all the issues put together.

As a teacher, I often take photographs of the children - for their work files, for school promotional materials, for the school website. It's part of the normal activity of a 21st century school.

As a man , however, I absolutely would not want photographs of other people's children - no matter what the circumstances - on my personal computer. It really would be beyond the pale, and, to use that lovely British expression, more than my job's worth.

School computers for school purposes belong in school and should be provided by the school for those purposes.

Any other arrangement just opens the door for all kinds of problems.

59
So if you work for the Maffia, you don't have to provide your own suit?

60
Seriously I doubt the OP wants it to come to the Prud'hommes.

The best thing to do IMO would be to meet up with all the other teachers tell them about the articles Shorrick mentioned and create a pressure group. They are not going to fire all the teachers at once are they?

Then go to the owner and negociate. Maybe not get her to pay for the whole computer (as it can also be used for personal use and the employee can take it with her when she leaves) but at least some of it.

At one company I worked at we got CHF 500.- a year to buy our IT stuff. I thought that was ok.