Work – Time off due to injury – the law and what's acceptable

Having a discussion at work re: time off for injury. Seems the area is a bit of a grey area for some (including myself). Interested in what you lot perceive is acceptable and whats right…

i.e. guy plays football one evening and busts his knee, is off the next day, can’t walk. Sick pay or take it as holiday?

or

I break myself on the bike and need a few days off. Again, sickie or no?

or

What about if your child is sick? compassionate leave or holiday?

What do you lot think?

This is all down to individual/company contracts AFAIK.

If you’re lucky you work for a company with a good sickness policy if not then you don’t have many real rights.

Injury is time of on fitness to work, you could come in and do alternative duties if you’re concerned.

Sick child depends on your employer you can request compassionate leave but if it’s just for looking after a vomiting kid then I’d take holiday or pay the shift back. Compassionate is for me if it’s more serious.

For a sick child, you can take parental leave. It’s a legal right for anyone with kids up to a certain age, but it’s unpaid.

For the first two of your scenarios, with my company it simply depends on if you can do the job. I’m an IT consultant and mostly work from home, so if my head and hands are ok, and I feel up to it, I can work. On the flip side, if I was on a client-site engagement and broke my leg, meaning travel was difficult, I’d be signed off sick.

Main point to this is one guy here thinks that it wans’t his fault that he got smashed up at football and the firm should take the hit.

Also, another had to take her dog to the vet and tried to claim it as sick pay!

Main point to this is one guy here thinks that it wans’t his fault that he got smashed up at football and the firm should take the hit

It’s not the company’s fault either so he may have to take the hit of SSP.

Main point to this is one guy here thinks that it wans’t his fault that he got smashed up at football and the firm should take the hit.

Accidents happen and sometime result in injury. If his injury is preventing him doing his normal job, then I don’t think it’s unreasonable for him to take sick leave.

If a long term smoker who worked for the company got cancer, would their sick leave for treatment be unreasonable? Still self-inflicted.

Also, another had to take her dog to the vet and tried to claim it as sick pay? total WTF moment that one.

That’s taking the pee though.

The one I always feel a little weird about is pre-booking sick leave for out or in-patient visits. And one I’ve never done is reclaiming holiday days when sick on holiday. I know it’s a legal right, but it always seems a bit picky.

As above, it really depends. IME, most decent companies would offer sick pay for the bike or football injuries above though may review that it if it’s a regular occurrence.

Time off to look after a sick child is usually unpaid or part of annual leave.

So if someone chooses a lazy sedentary lifestyle and has a heart attack as a result, whose ‘fault’ is that?

Depends on the company if you ask me. Usually, common sense and compassion apply, but if they’re the type to time your toilet breaks etc then take everything you can get. Contempt breeds contempt…

Contempt breeds contempt…

Fair point, but never underestimate stupidity! one persons reasonable request is anothers no go.

A lot depends on what the job is.

For an injury but I’m still able to use the phone, email, webex etc. Work from home, but I have long established clients and can call on this as I’ve given up large chunks of my life for them and they are well aware of this.

If I’m in a coma, I’d probably take that as sick leave – but that’s more of a retrospective thing, probably couldn’t call in sick from the coma.

But overall if I am able to work but unable to get to work or drive (currently do 1000 miles a week, so it’s a major factor), then I would work from home as best as I could.

For sick kids it depends how sick, just normal kid sick then take it as holiday or if possible between us work at home. If it’s a proper sickness or injury I would just say I’m not coming in and probably count it as compassionate leave.

All of the above is because I have a lot of credit with the company and clients, and treat my guys the same. If they have had sick children and let me know, they are just told to tell me what must be done as an absolute must from a work perspective, otherwise drop me a text to keep me informed and we’ll work it out later.

Im curretly on sick for 3 months my company give me full pay for 1 month and statutory for the rest. i am using 2 weeks holiday to boost it up.

the couldn’t find an alternative job

IME if they class a football injury as non sickness then folk just ring up and say they have a cold instead or sat they tripped in the street

your dog is really taking the piss though

Where I work is pretty fair on sick pay IMO (injury through an accident is nothing to feel guilty about), time off to care for sick children though is highlighted as being something that should be taken as holiday (or unpaid absence can be requested to). We’re even told you can’t work from home in that circumstance as it’s deemed you wouldn’t be doing your job properly if you’re running about looking after a sick child. While that’s understandable I’m more flexible and let team members WFH and start/finish early if they need to make doctors appointments (no one’s a strict 9-5 clock watcher so for me the flexibility works both ways).

And one I’ve never done is reclaiming holiday days when sick on holiday. I know it’s a legal right, but it always seems a bit picky.

A friend of mine who works in the same office as me, and lived a few doors down was on holiday when it snowed a few years back. Phoned up to cancel her leave because of the snow (didn’t actually impact, they weren’t going anywhere), then said they couldn’t come into work. I made it just fine!

I had 6 weeks off when I broke my wrist biking.

I could get from where I live to work easily ie Bradford to Sheffield.

I offered to work reduced hours (would take 4 hrs each way by public transport), and to work from. Both they said no to.

I just got signed off by the Doc.

As said above, accidents happen. You could get hit by a car while crossing the road to go to the shop, or slip on ice when it’s been cold. Would they hold that against you?

Bradford to Sheffield on public transport is doable but it takes a good few hours each way if you’re unlucky with connections. I did it once, took me 4 hours door to door with a couple of missed connections
Two hours min on the X33 express bus iirc city centre to city centre, plus the other journeys at each end

My company doesn’t pay first 3 days of sick in any circumstances. i suffered a workplace injury and that rule still stood. Also a list of sports that you won’t get any sick pay for, including both football and cycling. Makes me feel so wanted 🙁

My company doesn’t pay first 3 days of sick in any circumstances. i suffered a workplace injury and that rule still stood.

Time for no win no fee merchant. A couple of those and the policy will soon change.

Time for no win no fee merchant. A couple of those and the policy will soon change.

Mrs is a solicitor. Her advice was ‘leave’. I could go for a P.I. claim (and will if i leave). Just a sad state of affairs that people are treated with such contempt.

My company class mountain biking as ‘Extreme Sports’ so I don’t get any sick pay if I fall off. They changed the rule a year or two ago sneakily in a pay deal. An injury playing football is fine though, so most Monday mornings someone phones in sick as a few people play in the local Sunday league.

Having said that they did pay me sick leave for three weeks ‘as a one-off’ when I struggled through a night shift with three broken ribs. I think the boss felt obliged to after listening to me crack, creak, groan and pop painkillers like skittles for the whole shift!!

last time i did my collarbone i had a week off, same as i did the first time. but then i walked an hour to work the following 3 weeks until i could reasonably drive again.
people who do sport are generally healthier and therefore should make better employees.
lady who worked here probably took more sick days in a year than all of the remaining staff ( 12 ) had taken in 10 years. really. sedentary lifestyle.

My company doesn’t pay first 3 days of sick in any circumstances. i suffered a workplace injury and that rule still stood. Also a list of sports that you won’t get any sick pay for, including both football and cycling. Makes me feel so wanted

No sick pay or only SSP?

I know a place that rule cut the casual sick days dramatically.

And one I’ve never done is reclaiming holiday days when sick on holiday. I know it’s a legal right, but it always seems a bit picky.

I can’t quite get my head round it, and wouldn’t do it for myself but my old company insisted on this; I picked up a bug that saw me out of action for long enough to need a sick note, which confirmed the date of start of illness as being during a weekend and continuing through the day off that I’d planned and into the rest of the week when i should have been back at work. HR ‘refunded’ my day off. I wouldn’t have said anything but the fact i had a sick note put it in the open.

For me it was only a day, but another guy who broke his leg on the first day of a ski trip and was hence ‘sick’ for the following 5 days of his holiday and then another 3 or 4 weeks after returning, was refunded his ski holiday days as well.

Reading some of this makes me realize how lucky I am –

Looking after sick child = work from home

Sickness due to injury = normal sick rules, however I think they’d expect some level of home working after a couple of days.

Sickness while on holiday – never tested this one, and probably wouldn’t as it feels like taking the p**s.

Lots of snow = phone call to boss confirming he doesn’t want me to risk putting my company car in a ditch, then work from home.

Compassionate leave = down to managers discretion (although HR have guidelines) I had a week out last year when my brother died, then a day for the funeral, and a day for the remembrance event – my boss just put it down as ‘working from home’

I’ve got one of those jobs where nobody else really steps in while i’m off, so it is my interest to keep up with emails etc if i’m off.

I don’t get paid overtime, however I do travel from time to time – and you can’t really berate someone for being late due to a dentist appointment, if they’ve previously done an 18 hour day flying to France and back!

However, the fact I have about 2 days a year off sick at the most, and my boss + our director have a week off for a runny nose, means I can normally get what I need, when I need it.