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Gurgaon MNCs reset office timings to beat road jams

In any other office, your boss will yell at you and demand an explanation if you report to work late.

But not in Gurgaon, where several multinational companies (MNCs), tired of employees reporting late for duty because “they were caught in a jam”, have reset their office timings.

The workers were, of course, not making up — as their bosses could verify for themselves.

Leaving their homes well in time, the employees get caught in jams right outside their offices in DLF Phase III near Shankar Chowk.

The problem is so vexing in DLF Phase III that most companies with offices there have now changed their working hours, so workers can arrive on time.

KPMG, a global network of firms that provide auditing, tax and advisory services, has asked its staff to report one hour before the time they used to and also leave office early.

For the 700 employees working at KPMG’s Gurgaon office, the new office hours are from 8.30 am to 4.30 pm, changed from 9.30 am to 5.30 pm. The new timings came in force in March.

Other offices in the area, too, have followed in the footsteps of KPMG. “We thought only we were wise. But other companies also changed their timings once we changed ours,” Alok Singh, director (administration) KPMG, said.

The change in timings has been welcomed by employees. “Reaching office on time had become impossible, thanks to jams on the road leading to Cyber Park. You would be stuck in your car metres away from your office and you couldn’t do anything,” a KPMG employee who commutes from Dwarka said.

“It would take more than an hour to reach office after crossing the toll plaza on the Delhi-Gurgaon expressway, which is hardly a 10-minute journey on an empty road,” he added.

Scores of MNCs have their offices in the area, such as ESPN- Star Sports, ABN Amro, Sapient, RBS, ACME and Pricewaterhouse, besides KPMG. More than 24,000 employees work in offices located in Cyber City and DLF Phase III. And if 50 per cent of them commute in their own transport, then 12,000 cars cross the road daily during peak hours, causing jams.

“The main problem is, there is only one road leading to these offices from the Delhi-Gurgaon expressway,” Singh said.

The absence of overbridges for pedestrians and traffic policemen compound the problem.

“The traffic is regulated by private traffic marshals and motorists do not take them seriously,” Singh added.

According to officegoers, three to five accidents take place on the road every day. When reached for their views, the traffic police blamed the civic authorities, saying the road planning was done by the town planning department.

The officegoers suggested constructing a road between Belvedere and National Highway- 8 alongside a sewerage line under construction.

“Besides, vehicles other than those transporting office workers should be banned on the road during rush hours,” said an employee of ACME. Employees working in offices located on Sehraul Road, also located near Shankar Chowk, face the same problem.

Recently, industrialists and executives of MNCs located on the road organised a hawan and renamed the road as “Anath (Orphan) Road”, in an attempt to expose the indifference of the civic authorities.

The 2.5km Sehraul Road houses offices of Siemens, Pearl Pet, Agilent Technologies, Tupperware, HCL, Lumax, Orient Craft and Munjal Showa, but the road has not been repaired for the past four years, with civic agencies blaming one another for the poor upkeep.

Faizan Haider, Gurgaon, May 12, 2009 , India Today