No Fortitude For Longitude, Part 29

Bosses/Owners/Managers, Geography, Office, Time, UK | Working | January 12, 2026

I worked for a large multi-national tech firm a few years ago as a Technical Project Manager and was assigned to an account for a company that was headquartered in the US but had a local subsidiary in London that I would visit once a month to work on-site and assist with their solution with us.

This involved working with their account team, who were based in California. For anyone not aware, that means there’s an eight-hour time difference between my office location (London) and theirs (San Francisco).

I met the team for the first time when they were visiting the UK to discuss a new project. They all seem like nice, friendly people – once you get past that overly American-ness that shocks some Brits when we meet Americans for the first time. Very chatty, very bombastic, a big contrast to the more reserved attitude of most Brits.

Obviously, the time zone difference means that the times when we can both communicate while we’re all in the office are very limited. They start work basically when I’m finishing for the day, but I presume that they’re expecting this, and any emails that come in after I clock out and go home are left till 9 AM (my time) the next day to reply to.

One night, at around 8 or 9 PM my time, my phone rings, I check the caller ID and see that it’s the US account manager for this company’s account. Because I value work-life balance, I ignore the call and get ready to write and email to ask what he wanted as soon as I get in the office in the morning.

The next morning:

Manager: “[My Name], can I speak to you in my office?”

I’m a nervous person, so I’m already panicking because I can’t think of what I (in my mind) did wrong to cause this.

Me: “Uh, sure?”

Manager: *When we’re in his office.* “I had an email from [Account Manager] this morning saying that you’ve been ignoring messages from them. Is that true?”

Me: “I don’t think so? Unless an email’s gotten lost in my backlog, in which case I’ll go looking, does he say what or when he messaged me?”

Manager: “It says here he called you yesterday and you didn’t pick up the phone?”

Me: “…you mean when he called me at 9 PM, and I didn’t answer because I’m not contracted to work at that time and not being paid overtime?”

Manager: “…ah… okay, leave this with me.”

A couple of days later, my manager calls me for another meeting.

Manager: “So I had a response from [Account Manager].”

Me: “Oh? What did he say?”

Manager: *Turns his laptop around to show me the email.*

Email: “I understand that there’s a time difference between California and London, but if I’m working and call someone, I expect them to answer. We can’t just have people refuse to answer communications because it doesn’t suit them at any given time.”

Me: *Flabbergasted.* “So, he wants me to answer my phone… whenever he calls? He does realise that if he calls at 4 or 5 PM his time that’s…”

Manager: “Yes, don’t worry, you’re not going to get in trouble, and I’m going to give him a piece of my mind about respecting my team’s time.

Me: “Good luck with that…”

I never had any further contact with that Account Manager, and all communications came from other members of the team after that.