Location: Ohio
I’m a social worker for a retirement community, and after working a year and a half there my company has made the decision remove my work cell to save money. They want to reimburse me $15 a month to add a second line to my personal phone, as well as import our encrypted messaging system to my phone as well as my work email. I have already tried to have a dialogue with both my boss and the VP of my company surrounding my concerns(mainly surrounding HIPAA compliance and security) but to no avail. My boss and I were planning to look into adding a line on Monday, but after giving it some thought I have decided to refuse adding a line and will only be using my desk phone, even though I’m barely in my office. How can I approach this conversation with my boss? Can my company legally force me to use my personal cell for work purposes? Is there any other way for me to advocate for continued use of my work cell?
Comments
They can’t legally force you to do anything with your personal property. But they can fire you for refusing to do so.
Can’t speak to the legality, but maybe suggest that they purchase a prepaid phone and they can add money to it as needed. lol.
>How can I approach this conversation with my boss?
Likely “I resign.”
They can’t force you to do anything. But there’s nothing wrong with your continued employment depending on it.
I would be worried about privacy. Even adding a second line your phone can been connected to you by a simple google search. I would tell them either give me a work phone or I’m only taking calls to my desk phone.
My company required that they had remote access to my personal phone and the ability to erase it, if lost, if I had company material on it. I declined. Look into what actually is stored on the phone. If you have to add an app for VOIP phone access, that’s not storing info. Check the details. With a VOIP app, you can set office hours and can send calls to voicemail after hours.
Wife had the same thing happen. We just added a new line using the work phone so she didn’t need to add any of the sensitive company programs to her personal phone.