SINGAPORE: Are employees in Singapore ever really off the clock anymore? One foreign worker recently shared their surprise over what they felt was an oddly common workplace habit in the city-state: continuing to work remotely despite being sick.

In a post on the r/askSingapore forum, the worker said they relocated to Singapore a “few months ago to join a new company” and have since noticed a recurring pattern among their colleagues. Whenever someone falls ill, instead of taking medical leave completely, they simply shift to working from home.

According to the poster, employees would inform their boss that “they had a fever or were feeling unwell,” yet would still log in and continue handling their tasks remotely. They also noted that they had never seen managers explicitly encourage sick employees to rest and fully take the day off.

“Upon joining the company, there were no set days of sick leave, but employees could take time off wherever needed for health reasons,” the foreign worker wrote. “Now I am worried if I ever take medical leave, it will be frowned upon. Is this a common practice in Singapore?”

“Some people just don’t want their work to pile up”

In the comments section, many Singaporean Redditors said that this is actually pretty common, especially now that remote and hybrid work setups have become normalised.

They shared that, in many workplaces, employees usually only take full medical leave when they are seriously ill or too unwell to function properly. For milder illnesses like coughs, sore throats, or slight fevers, working from home has become the preferred option.

One user explained, “There’s sick, and there’s SICK. Depending on your work culture and your boss, if you’re just mildly ill (flu, cough, whatever), it’s actually more responsible to work from home so that you don’t spread the germs. Colleagues will generally understand if you’re not as productive for a day or two while you recuperate.”

“When you’re REALLY ill, the kind that needs you to be knocked out by drowsy meds, that’s what you really need your MC for, as you’d likely be out of action for a couple of days. Hope that makes sense.”

Another wrote, “I mean, there are some days where I’m sick but just a cough and sore throat. I can still physically work, but I don’t want to be spreading germs all over the office. So I WFH instead. That way, I don’t need to use medical leave, and the company doesn’t lose out on productivity since I’m still working. Win-win.”

A third commented, “It’s the norm now. When I was down with Covid and took 5 days of MC, I still got tasked with work while at home.”

A fourth remarked, “I guess some people just don’t want their work to pile up. Which is why they still work from home even when they’re sick.”

Still, not everyone agreed that this was an expected workplace culture. A few Redditors said they had never experienced this in their own companies and felt employees should simply rest when they are sick.

One added, “Not common. Just might mean that the company is undermanned, but they are trying their best not to inconvenience others, maybe?”

In other news, a frustrated software engineer took to social media to share that the firm he works for, which he hinted is an “infamous three-letter local IT company,” has been assigning him non-technical work for the past two years.

“I have not learned ANYTHING technical; every project I’m put on is just me doing PowerPoint and admin work,” he wrote on the r/singaporejobs forum. “Yet, I am expected to OT on weekends and even till midnight due to the sheer amount of work there is to do. It seems like the horror stories about this company are true.”

Read more: ‘I’m just doing powerpoints and admin work’: Software engineer frustrated over non-technical workload at company

This article (‘Sick colleagues keep working from home’— Foreign worker wonders if it is a norm in Singapore to work while feeling ill) first appeared on The Independent Singapore News.