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As an employer, you have a legal duty to ensure your staff’s health, safety and well-being. Therefore, you should have policies that cover sick leave. You must deal with it effectively given the cost of absent staff can be significant for any business. Therefore, following the law regarding sick leave can help minimise the impact of absent staff on your business. Hence, this article will explain what you should and should not do when your staff are on sick leave.
Keep in Contact With Your Staff
You must keep in contact with your employees during their time away from work on sick leave. This is part of your duty of care as an employer. However, you should ensure the contract solely regards their health with a focus on how they can return to work. Additionally, you should also keep them informed on changes in the business.
If your employee is off work in the short term, you may contact them regularly. However, this will be less frequent when they are on long-term sick leave. In saying that, the amount of contact will depend on the circumstances. Ultimately, you should be mindful of too much contact can be unreasonable, especially if the reason for sick leave is related to stress in the workplace.
Consider Reasonable Adjustments When Staff Return From Sick Leave
When your staff are on sick leave, you will want to help them return to work as soon as they are well enough. You can help them return by considering reasonable adjustments to allow this. For example, you may consider offering:
- fewer hours carrying out the role;
- flexible working;
- part-time working; or
- making changes to their working equipment.
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Obtain and Act on Fit Notes
Your employee should provide you with a fit note. A fit note is an official written statement detailing a GP’s medical opinion about your employee’s ability to return to work. When your staff have been absent from work for at least seven consecutive days, they must give you a fit note regardless of whether these are typical working days.
A fit note will either state that your employee is not fit to come back to work or that they may be fit to return to work where your employee should agree to changes that will help them. Additionally, your employee’s GP may suggest specific changes. You should note that if you and your employees cannot agree to the changes, they are not obliged to return to work.
Do Not Rule Out Considering Further Professional Health Advice
When your staff are on sick leave, you may need to consider having an occupational health assessment. An occupational health physician would generally carry this out and will let you know the status of your employee’s mental and physical health. This will indicate the readiness to return to work and what you can do to help their working environment be safer, healthier and more accessible.
Do Not Get Sick Pay Wrong
As an employer, you will likely detail in your employment contracts what entitlements staff have to pay when on sick leave. This will also be described in your sick pay policy, so ensure that you honour it and pay your staff the correct sick pay.
Whilst sick pay is at your discretion, your staff may be legally entitled to Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) which you must ensure you pay them. This is £99.35 per week and can be paid usually for up to 28 weeks in any three-year timeframe.
You must pay SSP where your employee:
- has been off work sick for at least four consecutive days regardless of whether these are standard working days;
- has let you know they are off work sick and require SSP within your policy timeframe or where you do not have one, within seven days;
- provides evidence of sickness such as a fit note; and
- earns typically a minimum of £120 per week before tax is deducted.
Key Takeaways
When your employees are on sick leave away from the workplace, you owe them several legal duties. Therefore, you should know what you should and should not do when your staff are off work unwell. For example, you should ensure that they give you a fit note from their GP when they have been absent for a minimum of seven days. You should also ensure that you do not fail to make reasonable adjustments for your staff to help them return to the workplace, such as a change in a working pattern to part-time hours or offering flexible hours.
If you have a question about sick leave, our experienced employment lawyers can assist as part of our LegalVision membership. For a low monthly fee, you will have unlimited access to lawyers to answer your questions and draft and review your documents for a low monthly fee. So call us today on 0808 196 8584 or visit our membership page.
Frequently Asked Questions
You should ensure that you pay your staff according to your sick pay policy and give staff the appropriate Statutory Sick Pay if they qualify for it.
You should avoid failing to seek further professional health advice, such as occupational health services. Seeking further advice can help you see how and when your employees may be ready to return to work.
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