Long-term sickness can be tricky to handle. There's administration to cope with and it's critical that it's handled in the right way, in the right order. If you don't, the chances are that you could find yourself on the wrong end of a compensation claim.

It's important to say at the outset that every case will be different and that rules and regulations change all the time, so it's important that you get up-to-date information from the right professionals about any employment situation before acting.

Continuing with business

Keep in contact with your employee to determine for how long they'll be absent. Make sure that they are aware of the situation regarding sick pay - how much, for how long - and any other conditions that they may have to fulfil to continue to get sick pay.

Of course, long-term sickness may start as a few days off but then grow into a longer-term problem if a medical condition escalates. For the health of your business it's important to assess whether you can cope long-term without that employee or whether they can be replaced by a temp or short-term contractor.

Planning

You also need to know whether your employee can be expected to return to work straight away or perhaps start with shorter hours and lighter duties. There may have to be special adaptations or equipment to help them perform their duties - that is unlikely to be something that can be done instantly.

They might even be unable to return to their previous position, so you may have to change their role. None of this can be planned if you simply have an open-ended sickness situation.

Medical investigation

This can be delicate but as time goes on (usually after a month of absence or several short absences) you can take steps to find out more. If you have a company doctor you can arrange for them to see the employee, if not you can appoint a doctor to make an assessment.

You can also ask the employee for permission to speak to their doctor, or for their doctor to provide a report. You can't force this, but if your employee refuses it will make your case stronger if you eventually have to go to court.

What's going on?

The next steps to be taken depend on whether there is genuine sickness or the employee doesn't want to return to work for some other reason. If it is genuine sickness then you can only wait for the situation to resolve itself and use temporary cover.

If you think something else is going on you will have to tread very carefully, but the procedures will change from sickness to disciplinary action. If you don't have company policies and procedures in place already, that process will become very difficult because a key part of the disciplinary process is to make sure employees are clear about how the procedures work.

Get help

If you don't have human resources experience or an HR manager there are plenty of people you can go to for help on a contract basis. They will advise you as to the right course of action and help you to decide when you need to get the appropriate legal advice.

They can also help you to put the right company procedures in place if you don't have them already.

Further advice

As well as getting advice from the professionals take a look at the Acas (Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service) website. Although Acas is best known for resolving disputes and getting involved in employment tribunals, it offers a great deal of advice to try to prevent businesses getting into those situations.

There are links to useful guides on the Acas website in the references section below.

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