More than 8 million Brits work from home

More than eight million of British employees now work at home for at least one day per week -- equivalent to almost a third (31 percent) of the entire working British populace.

The news comes from Virgin Media, which based its conclusions on a study of 2,006 employees. The report says homeworkers are bringing in £167 billion to the UK economy every year, and that number will only continue to grow.

This year, homeworkers spend 10.2 billion hours working from home, which represents a 26 percent increase compared to 2012.

Among those that still don’t work from home, many would love to do so at least one day in a week. More than half (58 percent) have expressed such desire, and if their wishes were to come true 15.6 million Brits would be working from home for 19.4 billion hours per year.

Virgin Media says that even if employees don’t get their way there will still be 12.9 billion hours of homeworking per year by 2022.

Homeworking has been made possible with the help of "fast, reliable broadband," with 71 percent reporting it to be "very important." It is more important than having a phone, having peace and quiet, a comfortable working environment, a coffee kettle or snacks.

"More people than ever are spending some of their working week at home, and our research shows that homeworkers depend on having a good broadband connection," says Kerris Bright, chief marketing officer at Virgin Media.

"As it consults on more robust broadband advertising rules, the ASA must consider Britain’s growing army of homeworkers, and require companies to advertise average speeds across a full day."

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