If you have a fit note are you allowed in work??

iammumtoone

As title if someone is given a fit note via the doctor can you ignore it and still go into work? or will you be in trouble from your employer if they find out you have come in when signed off by the doctor?

Thanks

tizerbelle

If you don't tell work about the fit note nor hand it in, they have no way of knowing that your doctor has signed you off. You are entitled to ignore doctor's advice, in the same way you can discharge yourself from hospital. Just if anything goes wrong, you can only blame yourself.

nimbo

I'd imagine you'd also have to take responsibility for the outcome of it potentially going wrong at work too.

So if your being signed off for a bad back and sitting at a desk doing some acccounts and have to go home. Fair play the books get delayed. If you're signed off for the same bad back and climb scaffolding carrying bricks and drop them on someone else's head. Your fault.

The level of risk associated with ignoring the doctors advice is a bit different. I realise that's an extreme - but personally I'd want to consider the potential outcomes.

[Deleted User]

iammumtoone wrote: »

As title if someone is given a fit note via the doctor can you ignore it and still go into work?

Did just this back in 2015 didn't hand the sick note into either the job centre or my new employer which fell into the timeline. Didn't even go back and see the GP and likewise in today's state of patient care they never enquiried whether I'd gone/returned to work at any point since.

I agree with with others yes you take responsibility if anything should go wrong and as for the title of this thread - yes you can take the note into the work premises if you've no other means to get it to them I think.? Might be corrected on that but it doesn't bother me.

sangie595

Under health and safety legislation you have a legal duty to look after your own health and safety,, not just that of others. If a doctor has said that got are not fit for work and you ignore that advice, it could be deemed a sufficient cause to discipline or dismiss someone if the employer finds out. And there are situations were you may put other people at risk depending on what the reason for being signed off is.

The correct thing to do is to discuss this with your doctor. If they think there are conditions in which you may be fit for work, they can specify and ask for these on a fit note. Or they may have assumed you want to be signed off (there is still a culture of signing people off for almost any reason), and if you say you don't want to be they don't!

But it is a bad idea to simply ignore a fit note that says got are not fit for work.

tea_lover

A fit note is advisory only, it has no legal standing.

EconomicsGirl

No do not go into work as it invalidates your works insurance. You can get doctor to cancel though but work will not thank you for going in.

tea_lover

EconomicsGirl wrote: »

No do not go into work as it invalidates your works insurance. You can get doctor to cancel though but work will not thank you for going in.

This is completely untrue. There is no link whatsoever with insurance and an advisory fit note. This is purely an urban myth.

EconomicsGirl

I was told it by a HR person but I'm not HR so could be wrong but was in a very large organisation.

tea_lover

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/578032/fit-note-guidance-for-employers-and-line-managers.pdf

"IMPORTANT: Your employee can go back to work at any time (including before the end of the fit note) without going back to see their doctor - even if their doctor has indicated that they need to assess them again. This will not breach your Employers Liability Compulsory Insurance"

sangie595

tea_lover wrote: »

A fit note is advisory only, it has no legal standing.

Yes it is advice. The health and safety legislation is not advice - it is the law. You therefore cannot make any assumption that ignoring a fit note telling you to refrain from work is not covered by health and safety conditions. So the employer is perfectly entitled to view failure to act on the advice of a doctor as a breach of the employees duty of care, and to act accordingly. You also have no idea WHY the person had been told to refrain from work. In some job roles, it would be a breach of the law in other respects to attend work. You do recall a bin man who shouldn't have been driving for medical reasons ploughing into pedestrians, don't you? Your advice is dangerous. You cannot simply tell someone the can ignore their doctors advice, go to work, and not inform the employer of the existence of the fit note, without a clue as to the circumstances. Just a common condition, for example, might not be a problem in many jobs - but might be a huge problem in food handling, where you are expected to stay away from handling food if you have communicable conditions, even minor ones.