Remote Work Is Failing Our Most Vulnerable Citizens

I heard a toilet flush during my Disability Access to Work scheme call.

The DWP employee was literally defecating while discussing my query. When I called him out, he hung up. The call was "unavailable to be traced" when I complained.

Welcome to essential services in the remote work era.

This wasn't an isolated incident. Every interaction I've had with government services, banks, and healthcare has revealed the same pattern of degraded professionalism and accountability.

The accountability vacuum is real. When I called my council about a tax bill error, I could hear a TV blaring in the background. The employee scrambled for their headset after I said "Hello" repeatedly. They muted the call and waited until I hung up.

On my third attempt, I finally reached someone competent. But she couldn't answer my simple question because she had to email a colleague instead of walking over to ask them directly.

What should have taken minutes stretched into weeks.

Privacy Breaches Are the New Normal

My bank employee discussed my private financial information while family members were clearly present in their home. Children screamed in the background. Someone else was obviously listening to every detail about my accounts.

When I raised this obvious GDPR violation, the response was laughable: "Oh it's ok, I have a special laptop and a secure connection."

Encryption doesn't make human ears unhearable.

The GDPR is crystal clear about data protection, yet we've normalised discussing sensitive information in kitchen tables and living rooms. Personal client data can be viewed by anyone in the household when employees work from home.

We're witnessing massive privacy breaches daily, but they're invisible and unreported.

The Most Vulnerable Pay the Price

I can push back. I can call out unprofessional behaviour and demand better service.

But what about the elderly person trying to sort out their pension? The person with learning difficulties trying to access benefits? The vulnerable populations who can't advocate for themselves?

They're bearing the brunt of this service degradation.

When my council tax query turned into a weeks-long ordeal because the employee couldn't immediately consult a colleague, I was frustrated. For someone struggling financially, that delay could mean losing their home.

Hospital appointments get missed or incorrectly scheduled. Benefits applications drag on while people can't pay rent. Simple queries become convoluted nightmares.

The people who most need these services working properly are the least equipped to fight back when they don't.

Feedback Systems Designed to Hide Failures

Here's the insidious part: we're not even capturing how bad this has become.

Vulnerable and disabled customers find giving feedback more challenging. When I ask remote workers to raise complaints, they claim they have, but I never receive follow-up.

Remote workers have every incentive to bury complaints rather than process them properly. Why would they document their own poor performance?

The U.S. Government Accountability Office recently admitted that federal agencies haven't even evaluated telework's effect on their ability to provide public services. We're conducting a massive experiment with critical infrastructure without measuring the results.

Customer satisfaction scores haven't dropped significantly because the people most harmed by poor service are least likely to complain.

The Psychology of Home Versus Work

There's something fundamental about the office environment that remote work advocates miss.

When we merge home life with work life, we relax too much. It's comfortable. It's where we're supposed to unwind, not handle life-altering decisions for strangers.

The ritual of coming home after a hard day's work and getting cosy creates necessary psychological boundaries. Remote workers have lost that separation.

The office environment encourages accountability, collaboration, and professionalism in ways that kitchen tables simply cannot replicate.

COVID Excuses Became Permanent Cost-Cutting

What started as emergency measures during lockdowns quickly became permanent cost-cutting opportunities.

Why maintain expensive office space when employees can work from home? The technology exists, so why not use it?

But essential services aren't just any business. Government services, healthcare, and banking handle life-altering decisions. They require the highest standards of professionalism, security, and accountability.

Major companies are recognising this. Fortune 500 companies are abandoning remote work at record pace. The share of remote workers fell to just 17% in 2024, down from 44% in 2023.

These companies understand what we're losing in translation.

Where to Draw the Line

I'm not anti-remote work entirely. Back-office admin roles and non-customer-facing positions can work remotely in many cases.

But customer service in essential sectors cannot. Government services, healthcare, and banking require immediate collaboration, secure environments, and visible accountability.

When employees can't confer with colleagues in real time, simple problems become weeks-long ordeals. When private information gets discussed in family kitchens, we've failed our most basic duty to protect citizens.

The hybrid model works for some roles, but not for those handling our most sensitive needs.

We've Eliminated Quality Control

We've closed physical bank branches. We've moved government services online. We've made citizens more dependent than ever on remote employees who operate without oversight.

Technology can never truly replace human connection and accountability, no matter how advanced it becomes.

We've eliminated the physical touchpoints that used to provide quality control, making us reliant on workers who can flush toilets during our most important calls.

Some companies are already bringing workers back to the office because they've noticed the decline. They're the canaries in the coal mine.

The question is whether we'll wake up to the human cost before our essential systems start to collapse completely.

The most vulnerable in our society are already paying the price. How much more degradation will we accept in the name of efficiency?

An employee works from a laptop on their bed