Festive faux pas | Is Xmas shopping on company time a sackable offence?

The Christmas period can be a chaotic time, both in and outside of work. Businesses frantically try and finish their to-do lists for the year, whilst planning holiday events and juggling the inevitable onslaught of annual leave requests.

Simultaneously, staff set their sights on their festive to-do lists, as resolve to keep working until the 24th slumps dramatically. Festive food shopping, ordering a blow-up bed for a relative who RSVP’d last-minute and, of course, the dreaded present sourcing ordeal.

Inevitably, some of this shopping time leeches out of personal hours and into work time. In fact, according to research from OpenX, almost seven in ten employees admit to online shopping whilst at work.

But with firms across the globe rushing to finalise all business by the new year, taking significant time out of the day for personal errands could be potentially damaging. So how should these situations be managed?