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Deloitte is planning to shutter four of its offices across the UK after Covid-19 has forced the firm to reduce spending and enforce remote working among its employees.
According to the Financial Times, some 500 employees working at offices across Gatwick, Liverpool, Nottingham and Southampton will be offered “full-time remote working”, with Deloitte’s property advisors “continually reviewing” the rest of its real estate portfolio.
It follows news announced earlier this month by the big-four firm that partners would see a 17% pay cut, despite the group’s revenue growing by almost a tenth.
At the time, The FT said the salary reduction was a result of the firm being “unable to cut costs fast enough in response to coronavirus disruption”, Deloitte also reported distributable profit for the year ending 31 May 2020 was £518m, falling 16% from £617m the year before.
The news outlet reported that the accountancy firm is one of the first large UK companies to terminate the lease on a number of its properties as a result of many employees making the move to remote working during the pandemic.
Stephen Griggs, Deloitte’s UK managing partner, told the FT: “Covid-19 has fast-tracked our future of work programme, leading us to review our real estate portfolio and how we use our offices across the UK, including London.
“[All employees at the four offices that are closing] will continue to be employed by Deloitte and any proposed change is to our ‘bricks and mortar’, not our presence in these regions.”
