What is a long-term sickness absence?

Generally, any absence of more than a few weeks is classed as a long-term absence, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and many larger companies would define a long-term sickness absence as lasting four or more consecutive weeks. A business should define long-term absence based on what suits its circumstances, and this will help to ensure a consistent approach in the management of long-term sickness absences.

If you don’t have a formal policy, make sure that all your employees know the procedures for reporting an absence.  Are you happy for your employees just to send you a text message for instance? Whilst a text message delivers a message quickly, you cannot form a conversation with an employee, getting a sense of their wellbeing and being able to ask questions that are queued up during a conversation such as ‘do you have an appointment with your doctor’, ‘are there any urgent tasks that need picking up’, ‘where have you saved the XYZ files’, this can all be covered in one telephone conversation rather than back and forth with texts. 

Regular contact

So, you have an employee off for a couple of weeks and now you have received a fit note for a further two weeks. The manager should contact the employee as early as possible, be sensitive to their circumstances and your communication style as this could affect their wellbeing and decision to return to work. For example, if the employees fit note, confirms their reason for absence is stress, you don’t want to tell them how busy work is because they are off work!

During this early check in you can agree the flow and format of the regular check-ins that you should put in place moving forward. Regular check-ins will enable managers to estimate the length of the absence and plan for this, the business will still need to operate. The check-ins should also be used to update the employee on what’s going on in the business and keep them connected, even if it’s an update on life events for their colleagues. The regular check-ins will be important if the employee is suffering with their mental health, it may be a routine to their day that helps them focus and improve their mood, don’t avoid these check-ins!

Support and impact

If an employee feels supported, they are more likely to feel comfortable in returning to work. As well as the regular contact, you may also be able to offer your employees access to professional support through an Employee Assistance Programme [EAP]. These offer 24 / 7 support and practical advice on issues that might be impacting their wellbeing and performance. Typically, they will include face-to-face counselling and telephone or online counselling.

You may already have access to an EAP service without being aware, check your life cover or permanent health insurance policies you have, an EAP could be an add on to your policy.

Depending on the illness your employee is suffering, this may be a long-term condition and as an employer you will need to consider the impact of this on them prior to their return to work. If this is a physical condition, is there any adjustments you could consider to accommodate the return, and if a mental health issue could you offer flexibility to support their return.

Get further advice and consider alternatives

If you have an employee on long-term sickness absence and you have no estimate of a return or you feel that the employee would need specific support to accommodate their return, you can obtain a medical report from their GP or an occupational health provider, with the employees’ consent.

These can be helpful in answering any questions you may have such as:

• How long is the employee likely to be off work?
• Is this a long-term condition?
• What alternative duties the employee might be fit to undertake if they are unfit to resume their normal duties.
• What support would they need to return to work? 
• Would they recommend any adjustments to their role? (it’s helpful to include the job description when requesting a medial report)

A medical report should help the business to determine how the employee can make a safe and healthy return to work, including identifying any adaptations that might be needed or advisable.

To support an employee to return to work, and in preparation, you should consider alternatives that may be available to facilitate the return, such as:

• Adjustments to the role
• A temporary or new role
• A change in the location of the role

Impact on long term absences on SME’s and considerations

If you are a small business a long-term sickness absence can have a significant impact on your business. The first obvious consideration is the immediate need of the activities that need to continue, can the remaining team pick up the work, or do you need to cover this in some way? Some options to consider is employing an agency temp, don’t forget there is an agency margin to pay on top of the rate for the worker. If you have a good estimate of the period of absence you could hire an employee on a fixed term contract, specifying the length of the contract at the outset while retaining flexibility to offer and keep on an individual if you find that circumstances allow you to do this. Or if the role will be difficult to replace, could you offer existing staff a secondment, providing a development opportunity and back fill the easier to fill role.

Do you have an employee on long term absence and need some guidance in managing this, or does the business not have a formal policy which is understandable, clear and equips managers to deal with long-term sickness absence?

If you need support schedule a call with me today.