Working from home? Sydney trader fired after laptop gives away his Singapore getaway

A Sydney-based currency dealer was fired after he told his employer he was “working from home” when he was actually still on holiday in Singapore.That was not the first time Charles Graham took working from home to time-zone-defying lengths. He had also previously worked from Bali while telling his manager he was at home waiting for a plumber to fix “recurring bathroom issues”.Graham won an unfair dismissal case on Oct 7. But, apart from four weeks’ worth of backpay, he walked away empty-handed.Australia’s Fair Work Commission determined that he did, in fact, lie because he was aware he was violating office policies, The Guardian reported. His company – HIFX Australia, trading as Xe – erred, however, in not following due process in dismissing him, the commission found.Xe fired Graham on Dec 2, 2025, after his company traced his work laptop to a hotel in Singapore when he was supposed to be working from home in Sydney on Nov 17.Fair Work commissioner Alana Matheson ruled that Graham deliberately hid his location, and that Xe had a valid reason to dismiss him. But she said the company failed to fully explain the case against him or give him a proper opportunity to respond.Graham had asked Xe in September 2025 if he could work in Singapore for a year. But the company refused, saying his role was based in Sydney, and it did not have a licence to operate in Singapore.Graham went on working from home for weeks, citing an eye injury. He then used his annual leave and went on a holiday.Graham was due back at work in November. On Nov 17, his manager, Abigail Plummer, contacted IT.“Our mate should be online today, first day since his holiday, so I will need your FBI skills,” she wrote in an e-mail.The resulting investigation revealed that while Graham was supposed to be in Sydney, “working from home”, he was, in fact, in Singapore.In his defence, Graham said his partner developed a bacterial infection during their holiday, forcing them to postpone their return to Australia.He said he intended to notify his manager but was too occupied with unread e-mails, incoming calls and a complaint from a high-value client.Xe rejected his explanation, saying the documents he supplied did not adequately establish that his partner could not travel or explain why he kept his location secret.The company also noted previous instances in which he arrived late to work and claimed he was either unwell or stuck with chores at home after a mandatory three-day-a-week office attendance policy was introduced.It followed an earlier incident in which Graham claimed he needed to work from home because a plumber was coming to fix his toilet, but was actually in Bali.Matheson, of the Fair Work Commission, found the concealment showed Graham understood he needed approval to work overseas.She described his failure to disclose his Singapore location as deliberate dishonesty.Some readers of The Daily Mail, which also reported on the case, were equally unsympathetic.“Give some people an inch and they will take a mile,” one wrote.Others argued that employers should measure output rather than office attendance, especially for those working off their laptops.“Who cares where he works from as long as the work is done,” one reader wrote.But the commission also found lapses in the way Xe handled Graham’s dismissal.Internal messages about sorting out a “strategy” and giving Graham “a bit of hope to turn up to the meeting” suggested the outcome might have been decided before his response was properly considered.Still, Matheson found reinstatement inappropriate and awarded no compensation. A fair process was unlikely to have saved his job.But he was entitled to four weeks’ pay in lieu of notice, and that one, Graham got.