re- booked holiday leave, then off sick?

jexygirl

Hi ya triker chick
unfortunately, in my experience, employees self cert for the first 5 days, but they dont get sick pay for the first 3, only ssp from the 4th and 5th day onwards, and any further days have to have doctors notes. The law is also on the side of the employee, in that the pre booked holiday "unfortunately" co incided with being "ill", therefore no holiday is taken, unless the employee decides to take the holiday pay for the days they are not paid for...
The joys of being an employer, when a buisness runs on minimal staff just cannot be compared to right

Savvy_Sue

tc, you do have well documented procedures for sick leave, don't you? I guess if not, you soon will ...

We don't HAVE to phone every day, but we do have to say when we expect to be back and phone again if that's not going to happen. So in my last sick leave period, I went home early on Monday, phoned on Tuesday and said I was dying, phoned again Wednesday to say still dying but hoped to be back Friday (I don't work Thursdays), and phoned again Friday to say improving but still couldn't talk so would see them all on Monday!

Where staffing levels are critical, you might want to agree that staff will phone the day before they intend to return - that way you don't have someone reappear when you're not expecting them and have their shift covered!

To take it as sick leave and get the holiday at some other time, they would need to produce a Fit Note from their GP advising them to refrain from work until after their holiday. Otherwise they've had 2 days sick and next week would be leave. If they claim they were sick but don't have the Fit Note, then they've got a choice, they can still have it as leave, or they can have it unpaid because they were not on sick leave because no note!

Personally I think people are more likely to take advantage if the company pays more than SSP - you're not going to take odd days off if you won't be paid, in my experience!