Keeping in touch with absent staff while off sick

Many sickness absence procedures contain rules for keeping in touch during sickness absence. These rules may require employees to contact their employer at regular, even pre-set, intervals. These rules should not be implemented in an unreasonable manner.

When sensitively managed, regular contact between employer and employee is generally recognised as good practice in terms of encouraging someone back to work. The Health and Safety Executive says “regular contact helps to keep work on their agenda and offers good opportunities to plan the return to work”. Many procedures are designed to encourage contact. However, if an employer turns up unexpectedly or telephones too frequently or at inappropriate times of the day this is likely to be intrusive.

Failing to keep a disabled worker off sick properly informed as to important developments, for example as to their terms and conditions, is likely to be a breach of the duty to make reasonable adjustments (Chawla v Hewlett Packard Limited [2015] UKEAT/0280/13/BA).

In any event, employees off sick must be remembered when it comes to collective consultation, for example in the context of redundancy or TUPE transfers (see Chapters 11 and 12) and special arrangements put in place.