What Is Unscheduled Telework? OPM Eligibility and Announcements

Unscheduled telework is a case-by-case approval that lets a federal employee work from an approved alternate location, usually home, when severe weather or an emergency disrupts normal office operations. The Office of Personnel Management introduced it in 2010 as a form of situational telework, and it now sits at the center of how agencies keep functioning through snowstorms, security incidents, and other surprises.¹ The approval is not part of any ongoing schedule; it applies only to the day it is announced, and the decision often lands the same morning you would otherwise be commuting.²

How You Find Out It’s Been Called

For federal offices inside the Washington Capital Beltway, OPM’s operating status announcements drive everything. When conditions deteriorate, OPM posts an updated status at opm.gov/status. The wording to watch for is “Open with Option for Unscheduled Telework,” sometimes paired with a delayed-arrival announcement.³ In rare situations, coordinated with the Office of Management and Budget, OPM can issue a governmentwide announcement covering federal workers nationwide.²

Don’t rely on the OPM DC Status mobile app. It no longer sends push notifications, and new users cannot download it from app stores.³ Check OPM’s website directly and whatever internal channel your agency uses, whether that’s email, text alerts, or an intranet posting.

If you work at a field office outside the Beltway, OPM’s DC-area announcements don’t apply to you. Your local agency head makes the call, using OPM’s governmentwide guidance as a reference but deciding independently.²

Who Is Eligible

Three conditions have to be true before you can use unscheduled telework. Your duties have to be work that can actually be done away from the office. You must have completed an interactive telework training program.⁴ And you must already have a signed written telework agreement on file. You cannot set one up the morning a storm hits.²

Employees the Statute Bars

The Telework Enhancement Act permanently disqualifies two groups from any telework arrangement. The first is anyone officially disciplined for being absent without permission for more than five days in a calendar year. The second is anyone officially disciplined for viewing, downloading, or exchanging pornography on a federal computer or while performing government duties. In both cases the statute requires termination of the telework agreement, not merely permits it.⁵ Separately, an agency can revoke telework if your performance drops below the standard set in your agreement, typically a “fully successful” rating.⁶

Emergency Employees

If your agency has designated you as an emergency employee, unscheduled telework generally isn’t available to you. Emergency employees are expected to report to the worksite on time, or stay there, during any operating status announcement, unless the agency specifically directs otherwise.² These positions are usually tied to public safety, facility security, or essential on-site functions.

Classified and Secure Work

The statute also carves out employees whose duties require daily on-site handling of secure materials the agency head considers inappropriate for telework, or daily performance of activities that cannot be done remotely.⁵ Positions requiring regular access to a Secure Compartmented Information Facility typically fit. The word to pay attention to is “daily.” If most of your work is unclassified and you only touch classified systems periodically, your agency may still approve telework for the unclassified portions.

Setting Up Before an Emergency

The setup work has to happen well before anything goes wrong. Scrambling to configure a VPN the morning of an ice storm is already too late.

Every federal employee who teleworks needs a signed written agreement with a supervisor. This is a statutory requirement.⁵ For unscheduled telework specifically, you need a situational telework agreement on file. The form documents your alternate worksite address, a phone number for that location, your schedule type, and a safety checklist confirming your workspace is adequate.⁷

Your agreement also documents what technology you need and whether you or the agency provides it.⁷ At a minimum you need a working VPN connection, which creates an encrypted tunnel between your home network and agency systems.⁸ Multi-factor authentication is standard. Test all of it on a calm day.

One preparation step catches people off guard. When a significant weather event is forecast in advance, your agency may expect you to take your laptop home the night before. If the storm was reasonably predictable and you left your equipment at the office, you could lose access to weather and safety leave for failing to prepare. That consequence is worth understanding before it happens.

What to Do the Day It’s Announced

Once an operating status includes unscheduled telework, you must notify your supervisor that you intend to telework. OPM’s guidance treats this notification as mandatory every time.² The method depends on your agency: email, phone, instant message. Don’t skip it. Supervisors have to know where staff are and whether the work is covered.

After that, log in through the VPN, verify your connection, and work. The expectation is a full day. If you don’t have enough work to fill your entire tour of duty, you must account for the gap, either by taking unscheduled leave for the whole day or by combining telework hours with leave for the remainder.² Logging off early and calling it a snow day isn’t one of the options.

The Weather and Safety Leave Catch

This is the part that blindsides federal workers. If you’re enrolled in your agency’s telework program, even if you rarely telework, you generally cannot receive weather and safety leave when offices close. You are expected to work your full day from your approved telework site, take leave, or do some combination.⁹ A non-telework colleague might receive a paid day off. You, as a telework participant, are expected to keep working.

The regulation offers two narrow exceptions. If the agency determines the emergency was unforeseeable and you weren’t prepared to telework, such as a sudden earthquake knocking out power before you could gather your equipment, the agency may grant weather and safety leave. And if the same emergency that closed the office also affects your home, through a power outage, flooding, or infrastructure damage that prevents you from safely working, the agency has discretion to grant leave.⁹

Both exceptions are discretionary. And if a major snowstorm was in the forecast for days and you didn’t take your laptop home, the agency can deny leave because you failed to take reasonable preparation steps.⁹ Keep your telework setup ready at all times. Telework eligibility trades the possibility of a free day off for the obligation to work from home.

Early Departures

If you’re already at the office when an early departure is announced, telework participants generally receive weather and safety leave only for the commute home. Once you’re back, you’re expected to finish the day by teleworking, taking leave, or a combination, unless one of the regulatory exceptions applies.²

Common Situations While Teleworking

You Lose Power or Internet

Contact your supervisor immediately. From there the agency decides: you might be told to take leave for the remaining hours, report to an alternate location if conditions allow, or wait for service to be restored. A connectivity failure at your telework site is one scenario where weather and safety leave may be available under the exception for conditions affecting the telework location.⁹

School or Daycare Is Also Closed

OPM is direct: telework is not a substitute for dependent care.¹⁰ Whether you can effectively telework with children at home during an emergency depends on your agency’s specific policy. Some agencies address it directly; others leave it to supervisor discretion. If caregiving demands make real work impossible, use leave for part or all of the day rather than logging telework hours you can’t productively fill.

You Get Injured at Home

Federal employees who suffer work-related injuries at their alternate worksite are covered under the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act, the same workers’ compensation framework that applies at the office.¹¹ The injury has to be connected to performance of your duties. Tripping over a power cord walking to your desk during work hours is a different story than hurting yourself cooking lunch. Document any incident thoroughly and report it to your supervisor the same way you would at the office.

1
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Agency Closure
2
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Governmentwide Dismissal and Closure Procedures
3
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Current Status
4
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 USC 6503 – Training and Monitoring
5
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 USC 6502 – Executive Agencies Telework Requirement
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U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Can Telework Be Revoked?
7
Department of Defense. DD Form 2946 – Department of Defense Telework Agreement
8
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. Selecting and Hardening Remote Access VPN Solutions
9
eCFR. 5 CFR 630.1605 – Weather and Safety Leave for Telework Employees
10
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Due to an Emergency Where Schools Are Closed, Can Employees Telework With School-Aged Children at Home?
11
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. While Teleworking, an Employee Is Injured at Home – Is This a Line of Duty Injury?