Attendance/Sickness Absence
Absences from the workplace, whether short or long term, have costly implications for your business. Absence management can help your business, plan, manage and implement policies and procedures to minimise interruption to the business.
Sickness absence is inevitable, as it is impossible to eliminate and manage all health conditions. However the absence management process will help you to understand the health condition, the impact on the employee, and how it may impact the workplace, allowing you and your business to make informed decisions regarding workforce planning, reducing the impact.
When to refer for Attendance/Sickness Absence Management
Some absences are planned, such as elective surgery. A proactive approach to the planned sickness provides benefits for you and your employee, by advising the expected time period away from the workplace and making recommendations to support a return to workplan.
Reactive sickness management happens when an employee reports sick for their duties. This maybe a physical or psychological reason. The process for occupational health, is to provide guidance on their health, the medical management plan, focusing on fitness for work and their return to work plan. The process involves working with managers and the employee to make the return to work as simple as possible.
Why is it important to manage sickness absence?
Sickness absence can be costly to your business and to the employee. Sometimes absences can be prolonged, increasing tangible and none tangible costs.
There may also be a legal obligation to your employee, under the Equality Act 2010, The Employment Rights Act, Management of Health and Safety at Work Act and the Safety at Work Act. Policies such as a detailed sickness absence policy and formal procedure to manage sickness, may help protect you from discrimination law and failing to provide a safe workplace. This applies to all industries, such as construction, education, manufacturing, education, retail and heavy industry.
Independent specialist occupational health advice can assist you and HR to ensure the situation is managed fairly. Advice and recommendations can help with return-to-work interviews and provide suggestions for reasonable adjustments.
What is a management referral and what is the process?
- Management or HR identify an employee with a health issue, which is impacting work, or work is impacting their health, occupational health is discussed with the employee.
- Management/HR complete the referral form. The contents of the referral form is discussed with the employee.
- A mutually agreed appointment time is provided.
- Employee consent is obtained for the consultation and for a report to be written. The report is an independent view of the situation, based upon the evidence available. The overview is factual, but the opinion is a medical opinion, which can not be changed by the employee.
- Depending upon the employees wishes, the report can be released to management/HR (or those named on the referral form) at the same time or the employee can request they review the report first (prior sight). The report is released within 3 days. It may be delayed if prior sight/ amendments are requested. The employee has 5 working days to provide consent.
- If consent is obtained, the report is sent by email. The employee is within their legal rights to decline consent to share the report with management. In this situation management receives notification that consent was denied. This allows management to make a decision in the absence of specialist medical opinion.
We can help ensure that you remain fully compliant with all workplace and governmental laws that surround absence management in the workplace. All while getting you the results you require. Contact us to discuss your requirements and we’ll help ensure your workforce can return to work after long periods of absence safely.
