- Response from the company on Glassdoor about RTO isn't truthful. One response from a company rep below says they "have been clear that we are an office-based culture and would return when it was safe to do so". This is less misleading and more an outright fabrication. Priceline introduced a "five day flex" policy in 2021, and internal documents up to at least December 2023 indicated that this policy was intended to be permanent. These documents also stated, "we have not been a 'face time' culture and will not become one in this new era." This kind of distortion reflects the reality of top-down communication at Priceline.
- The decision to eliminate the policy wasn't based on any metrics that leadership chose to share with employees. When asked about the metrics behind the decision, they essentially responded with, "we don’t have any."
- The policy rollout was chaotic and poorly executed. I have heard of other companies rolling out RTO for employees within a certain commuting radius. This did not happen here. Employees with 5-8 hour commutes were not exempt from the policy and HR was ruthless in its enforcement. Despite what company reps may say here, there are (were) plenty of employees outside a reasonable commute distance. In my experience, many employees viewed this as a "soft layoff." Additionally, there was an official layoff of 7%, which included the dismissal of people that had been working there for almost 20 years. This reflects the broader attitude of leadership towards employees.
