• Amazon corporate employees must return to an office five days a week starting January.
• Amazon updated its policy to immediately end a remote work benefit for most employees.
• The benefit was popular. Staff used it to stay close to family while working during the holidays.

Amazon‘s strict new RTO policy starts in January. But the company just ended a popular remote-work benefit months before that.

In 2021, Amazon gave staff the option to work up to four weeks a year fully remote from any location within their country of employment. This was part of a flexible return-to-office initiative.

Last week, the company radically altered this approach by requiring all corporate employees to work in an office five days a week starting next year.

It shared an FAQ document with staff explaining how the mandate will work. This stated that the four-week remote work benefit would end, but it didn’t specify a date.

On Monday, the company updated the guidance to end this benefit immediately, unless employees had already arranged something. This is three months ahead of the full RTO rule kicking in.

“Moving forward, this will not be a policy,” the company wrote, according to an excerpt of the latest FAQ that was obtained by Business Insider.

One Amazon employee told BI that the remote-work benefit was popular. Many colleagues used these four weeks to stay close to their families while still working during holiday periods.

“They don’t want us here,” the person added, suggesting that Amazon may be trying to force out employees who favor remote work and don’t want to be in the office full time. Amazon didn’t respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.

The updated Amazon FAQ document describes the change like so:

“With this update, will we continue to have the option to work four weeks out of the year from anywhere? Can I use the work from anywhere policy through the end of 2024?”

“If you already have plans in place with your manager to use the work from anywhere time in 2024, it is fine to do so. Moving forward, this will not be a policy and when an employee needs the flexibility to work from a location outside of their assigned office for an extended period of time, they should talk with their manager. If the request is for more than three weeks, the employee and their manager should discuss the possibility of a short-term work arrangement. If your manager is aligned, you can request a short-term work arrangement through My HR which may require additional approvals.”

Some Amazon employees have slammed the five-day RTO mandate.

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