Signed off with stress, where do I stand?

gitaaotaku

Firstly, some context.

The company I work for (a large school/college) went through a takeover at the beginning of the year. They're now starting to turn the screw and are changing all of our systems and giving us more work but with tighter deadlines and sending us to other sites. All with a much less friendly approach to boot. I was provided a fit note from my GP on Monday September 7th which signed me off work with stress for up to 6 weeks with a potential return date of October 19th. I have an exisiting medical condition anyway (glaucoma) and I'd not been sleeping very well, had been suffering from migraines, nausea and vomiting on/off over the last few weeks. So after a phone consultation with my GP he put the cause down as 'work related stress'. He told me to take some time off work and relax. 

I sent the note to HR that same day and to my surprise our HR Manager phoned me at 9:00am the following morning to passive-aggressively tell me that a meeting will be arranged in a couple of weeks time with herself and my Line Manager to discuss things. She also explained 'how very surprised' she was that my GP had signed me off for 6 whole weeks. Do you know if this is common practice to arrange a meeting so soon before my fit note ends? Is it right that they're questioning a qualified GP in this manner? 

The following day the HR Manager emailed me again explaining that she'll have to get OH involved as well. I'm now even more stressed than I was before knowing that an impending Teams meeting and OH referral is coming just 2 weeks into my 6 week fit note.

I honestly thought they might have learnt their lesson by now as we've already had a member of staff commit suicide back in April at another site. 

Any help or advice is much appreciated.

P.S I'm also a member of Unison and they've been made aware of everything so far. I've also been at the company for 12 years. 

Comms69

Involving OH is what an employer should do in such circumstances; a meeting with your line manager would be appropriate to discuss workloads etc

Undervalued

gitaaotaku said:

Firstly, some context.

The company I work for (a large school/college) went through a takeover at the beginning of the year. They're now starting to turn the screw and are changing all of our systems and giving us more work but with tighter deadlines and sending us to other sites. All with a much less friendly approach to boot. I was provided a fit note from my GP on Monday September 7th which signed me off work with stress for up to 6 weeks with a potential return date of October 19th. I have an exisiting medical condition anyway (glaucoma) and I'd not been sleeping very well, had been suffering from migraines, nausea and vomiting on/off over the last few weeks. So after a phone consultation with my GP he put the cause down as 'work related stress'. He told me to take some time off work and relax. 

I sent the note to HR that same day and to my surprise our HR Manager phoned me at 9:00am the following morning to passive-aggressively tell me that a meeting will be arranged in a couple of weeks time with herself and my Line Manager to discuss things. She also explained 'how very surprised' she was that my GP had signed me off for 6 whole weeks. Do you know if this is common practice to arrange a meeting so soon before my fit note ends? Is it right that they're questioning a qualified GP in this manner? 

The following day the HR Manager emailed me again explaining that she'll have to get OH involved as well. I'm now even more stressed than I was before knowing that an impending Teams meeting and OH referral is coming just 2 weeks into my 6 week fit note.

I honestly thought they might have learnt their lesson by now as we've already had a member of staff commit suicide back in April at another site. 

Any help or advice is much appreciated.

P.S I'm also a member of Unison and they've been made aware of everything so far. I've also been at the company for 12 years. 

Although GPs often do that in an attempt to be helpful it is largely meaningless. The GP can make a medical judgement from seeing you that you are suffering from stress. What he cannot do is is certify the cause as he is only going on what you tell him and hasn't seen the work situation first hand. For all he knows the work could be idyllic and the real cause of your stress is a domestic situation you haven't told him about!

Taken literally (i.e not reading between the lines) your work HR department have done nothing wrong. Seeing an OH specialist is not unreasonable. Any doctor's (or other medical professional's) first duty is to the patient, not to whoever is paying them.

There may be valid reasons for it but it is fairly unusual to be signed off for six weeks in the first instance. So although I agree your HR person wasn't very tactful what they said is a valid thought.

TELLIT01

Undervalued said:

gitaaotaku said:

 So after a phone consultation with my GP he put the cause down as 'work related stress'.

Although GPs often do that in an attempt to be helpful it is largely meaningless. The GP can make a medical judgement from seeing you that you are suffering from stress. What he cannot do is is certify the cause as he is only going on what you tell him and hasn't seen the work situation first hand. For all he knows the work could be idyllic and the real cause of your stress is a domestic situation you haven't told him about!

Taken literally (i.e not reading between the lines) your work HR department have done nothing wrong. Seeing an OH specialist is not unreasonable. Any doctor's (or other medical professional's) first duty is to the patient, not to whoever is paying them.

There may be valid reasons for it but it is fairly unusual to be signed off for six weeks in the first instance. So although I agree your HR person wasn't very tactful what they said is a valid thought.

I've been retired from DWP for a couple of years now, but when I worked on ESA, it was common for medical certificates to state Work Related Stress.  Much medical diagnosis is done on the basis of what the patient says to the doctor, not on what they have seen first hand.

I agree that the company seems to be acting properly in getting OH involved and proposing a meeting with your manager to address the workload issues.

Undervalued

TELLIT01 said:

Undervalued said:

gitaaotaku said:

 So after a phone consultation with my GP he put the cause down as 'work related stress'.

Although GPs often do that in an attempt to be helpful it is largely meaningless. The GP can make a medical judgement from seeing you that you are suffering from stress. What he cannot do is is certify the cause as he is only going on what you tell him and hasn't seen the work situation first hand. For all he knows the work could be idyllic and the real cause of your stress is a domestic situation you haven't told him about!

Taken literally (i.e not reading between the lines) your work HR department have done nothing wrong. Seeing an OH specialist is not unreasonable. Any doctor's (or other medical professional's) first duty is to the patient, not to whoever is paying them.

There may be valid reasons for it but it is fairly unusual to be signed off for six weeks in the first instance. So although I agree your HR person wasn't very tactful what they said is a valid thought.

I've been retired from DWP for a couple of years now, but when I worked on ESA, it was common for medical certificates to state Work Related Stress.  Much medical diagnosis is done on the basis of what the patient says to the doctor, not on what they have seen first hand.

I agree that the company seems to be acting properly in getting OH involved and proposing a meeting with your manager to address the workload issues.

I know it is common, the point I was making is that a GP simply writing "work related stress" on a sick note is unlikely to be sufficient if the matter ends up in a employment tribunal. A far more detailed medical assessment would generally be needed to prove, on the balance of probabilities, that work was the (whole) cause.

gitaaotaku

Thanks everyone, that's all I need to know moving forward. 

TELLIT01

gitaaotaku said:

I honestly thought they might have learnt their lesson by now as we've already had a member of staff commit suicide back in April at another site. 

Their actions by involving OH and company management would suggest that they are doing everything 'by the book' and therefore may well have learnt from previous events.  Failing to support employees, and having evidence of that support, is potentially more damning than being too pushy from an employee viewpoint.  Suicide is rarely an action based on a single event, and to imply that the employer was the root cause of this event is questionable, although I accept it may have been a contributory factor.

Xbigman

I strongly suggest you read your companies sick policy. It's not unusual for those classed as long term sick to have a different procedure to those off short term, and a 6 week sick note straight off would get an instant long term sick classification from most employers.


Darren

antonic

As someone who has previously been unfortunate to have suffered from this myself, my advice would be 
1) Keep in contact with your employer and co-operate with them - it makes life easier for you
2) Keep your Union Rep involved
Luckily I made it through my 6 month period of work related stress and am now back at work full time.