What it do? Your calendar says “focus time”. Your Slack notifications disrespectfully disagree.

In today’s newsletter:

The world’s second-largest container shipping company wants all of its staff back onsite.

Around 100 office employees at A.P. Møller-Maersk in Antwerp went on strike on October 1 over the company’s plan to end current work from home arrangements starting January 1, 2027. Since the pandemic, Belgian staff have been working from home up to three days per week. The new policy isn’t solely for Belgium; it applies across all Maersk offices worldwide.

“The staff were willing to compromise, but five days is too much,” said Joost Lestabel, a representative for the white-collar union BBTK. He added that Antwerp management, usually an ally on issues like this, didn’t share that view. Employees also pointed to Antwerp’s chronic traffic as a reason a five-day commute isn’t workable.

More striking action is reportedly planned for October 13.

Maersk isn’t the only company finding out that remote RTO memos land differently in Europe. That same week:

Why Belgium matters: Belgian white-collar unions can negotiate working conditions at the company level, so a policy set at headquarters runs straight into a local bargaining obligation. That’s part of why disputes like this one escalate to actual strikes rather than petitions.

The takeaway? Worldwide RTO policies aren’t always as uniform as they sound. Where labor law gives workers a seat at the table, the final version might look different depending on the country.

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The environmental case for remote work usually comes down to vibes: fewer cars, cleaner air. Researchers at ENEA, Italy’s national energy agency, and the Bank of Italy put actual numbers on it.

Based on 4,255 survey responses from Bank of Italy staff, a remote workday produced about 1.1 kg of CO₂e per person, roughly a quarter of the 4.1 kg from the average commute. That works out to a cut of up to 75%.

Working from home isn’t emissions-free though. The extra energy used at home came mostly from heating (63%) and cooling (29%), with computers and lighting making up just 8%. The commute numbers explain the gap: the average trip was 22.2 km and took 42 minutes, and staff who work mainly from home lived much farther out, at 78.4 km and about 87 minutes each way.

The Bank of Italy isn’t just studying hybrid work either. In 2024, 38% of its staff’s working days were remote, rising to 42% at its central administration.

Why this is back in the conversation

The study first came out in the spring, but energy prices have given it a second life. In France, diesel averaged €2.39 per litre on September 30, and the government has started encouraging employers to use telework again. It also raised the tax-free ceiling on employer-paid fuel allowances from €600 to €1,000 per year through December 31.

Worth noting: this is one employer’s workforce based on self-reporting data, and results will vary with climate and how people commute. But the researchers say their per-day estimates could become a reference point for other organizations trying to measure the emissions tied to remote work.

🇨🇦 RTO is on the ballot in Ottawa. Canada’s capital votes for mayor on October 26, and return-to-office has become a defining issue in the race. Candidate Neil Saravanamuttoo opposes the federal government’s four-day mandate and says he’d push for a delay. Jeff Leiper says he’d drop the city’s own five-day mandate where flexibility doesn’t hurt public service. Mark Sutcliffe, the incumbent, supports the policies, arguing they’ve helped downtown businesses. A mayor can’t change federal rules, but more than 100,000 federal workers live in Ottawa. Meanwhile, the government is still short on desks: 10% of federal public servants can’t be accommodated in the office four days a week this fall, and the goal is to get that down to 5% by March 31, 2027.

💰 When does your home office become your employer’s tax problem? The OECD published the full 2025 edition of its Model Tax Convention, the template countries use to write tax treaties. It includes guidance on when working remotely abroad can create a permanent establishment, a taxable presence for your employer in another country. The short version: if you work remotely abroad less than 50% of your time over any 12-month period, it generally isn’t considered your employer’s place of business. At 50% or more, it depends on the facts, including whether there’s a real business reason for you being there, like serving local customers or covering other time zones. Letting someone work remotely just to retain them or save on office costs doesn’t count as a business reason. Remember, this is a model, not law. Actual treaties still decide, but it’s a good sign of where tax authorities are heading.

📞 Call center jobs are shrinking and AI is a likely suspect. For more than a decade, call centers were a reliable entry point into office work in middle- and lower-income countries. New Revelio Labs data shows global call center headcount now at 5.3% below its December 2023 peak and has fallen year over year for eight straight quarters, the only eight declines in 70 quarters since 2009. The drop started in high-income countries and worked its way down. Revelio can’t directly observe companies swapping people for AI agents, but since ChatGPT launched, call center jobs have stalled while other white-collar work in the same countries kept growing. Most of the reduction comes from slower hiring rather than layoffs. The tougher news is that only about 11% of the people who leave call centers move into the better-paid roles that are still growing, like tech support, customer success, or software. That matters for remote job seekers, too. Call center and customer service roles are some of the most common and competitive) entry-level work from home jobs, and plenty of people use them as a first step before pivoting into more technical work. If that first rung continues to get smaller, so does one of the more reliable paths into remote work. Revelio’s data covers call center jobs overall, not just remote ones, but the pattern is worth watching.

La dolce vita, now with a rooftop pool. Rome gets a new place to unwind this weekend. Experimental Roma opens October 10 on Via Ludovisi, just off Via Veneta and a short walk from Villa Borghese, the Spanish Steps, and the Trevi Fountain. The 82-room hotel comes from the group behind Paris’s Experimental Cocktail Club and is set inside a restored former bank, with interiors by designer Rodolphe Parente. Highlights include:

Heads up if you’re planning a trip this fall: booking listings show the pool as seasonal, open through October 31. So, if a rooftop swim is the goal, this month is your window. Otherwise, the cocktails will be there throughout winter.

Flamingo: the day counter for people whose passport gets more use than their office badge. Between the OECD’s 50% rule and visa limits like Schengen’s 90 days in any 180, knowing exactly where you’ve worked matters more than ever. Flamingo tracks your days by country and US state, flags when you’re getting close to a tax residency or visa threshold, and keeps your travel log stored on your device and iCloud. It’s for iPhones only but free to download with a 30-day trial of all features before the paid plan starts. Check out Flamingo →