To use annual leave for a medical procedure?

[PinkFishies]

I have ongoing gynae issues which I’ve had symptoms for since I was a teen. I’m 30s now. I’ve had a bit of time off for a past op, was given 2 week sick note by the surgeon and have had time off due to symptoms being bad. Very heavy bleeding, excruciating pain etc. too bad to be able to work from home so have to call in sick. I have another upcoming procedure where I’ll be under general anaesthetic. Management are keen for me to use annual leave to cover the days I’m off instead of sickness as they don’t want me to hit sickness triggers. I don’t want to use annual leave as I’d rather use it for time off I can enjoy instead of laying at home recovering. Thoughts?

You are sick.

That's not what annual leave is for.

What impact would hitting the sickness triggers have?

Absolutely not. No way should you be using annual leave for a medical procedure. It's outrageous they're suggesting it

You shouldn’t have to take annual leave, does your employer have a limit of paying sick days other than paying statutory sick pay.

As PP above said. If you used Annual Leave instead of sick leave would they be able to avoid doing a phased return etc or anything else you need either routinely after the Op or if something doesn't go as planned? Just wondering if they are trying to worm out of something particular.

The sickness triggers argument is ridiculous.

They know you require surgery, and time to recover from that. It’s not some unexplained pattern of sickness that suggests anything untoward.

I’d email HR and tell them that you are unwell and recovering from surgery to treat an ongoing long term condition. You will require another surgical procedure as part of your treatment, and will need time to recover from that too. That ways, when you take the time off and have to do whatever ridiculous performance the company have put in place as part of their sickness policy, you can describe this as the additional procedure that you’d advised HR about well in advance.

@PinkFishies We would be expected to have any medical procedures (unless urgent) done in the school holidays, and all non-urgent appts, but this is because I'm a teacher so it's different.
You can self-cert for 7 days and then need to show a Fit Note from your GP I think?

Management are being ridiculous. You are sick. You take sick leave.

I'd advise calling ACAS to get their advice on how to handle this.

I would just say that you wouldn't want to fraudulent as it's clearly sickness related and not personal time off. If they push then ask if they will give you extra annual leave days as that's the only way you still will have your legal allowance of holiday.
Definitely not been unreasonable!

Some workplaces suggest taking AL rather than sick pay if they only pay sat sick and staff don’t want their pay to be impacted. As far as I am aware this should be the only reason. Is your manager worried that you will get a smaller pay packet and question it or be left struggling?

They can't expect you to do this. You're sick and utilising sick leave appropriately

I was a teacher for 20 years.

It isn't possible to arrange for operations to be done in the school holidays - normally you are told a date and absolute best case you might be able to move it if your dad just died or something.

Many schools try to insist medical stuff is done out of school time but this is illegal.

I am disabled and have had multiple operations and have had to point out on several occasions that schools are breaking the law.

Your managers are totally unreasonable!

Some places have a policy where if anaesthetic is involved it has to be sick leave anyway so you should check with hr the correct procedure

@Octavia64 We are told that all appts should be made out of school hours. For example, would not be given time off for any dentist appts.

Thank you all for the replies. I feel a bit like a doormat now for agreeing to them that I’d put in an annual leave request😓 I work for NHS so going to read the sickness policy.

This is fine for routine check ups,in my job we would be expected to do a check up before or after work or during lunch periods but emergency dental treatment or an urgent medical appointment is different.

Four weeks time I have a hospital appointment. Beggars can’t be choosers with appts plus many doctors only do certain days for consultations. As rest of week - surgery or at another hospital.

Work only giving me an hour’s pay! This department is notorious for not being seen on time. Think the record is 2.5 hours after time and best - 20 mins.

They used to give us the full day or half day paid.

Just because you've agreed doesn't mean you can't change your mind. The NHS really do seem to be the worst for sickness absences and staff sickness triggers particularly as operational staff are with sick people all day (obvs not the case here).

@MalbecandToast Yes, like I said, time off given for emergency appts only. Not for "pre-booked" ones.

Op, it's a gynae issue that is long term. Does it affect you day to day when it is unmedicated/flares etc?

This is possibly under the equality act as discrimination for either sex or disability - please seek advice.
In which cae, I'd wonder it should not be part of the sickness triggers at your company (as is true for pregnancy related illness as that'd be gender discrimination).

I'd try ACAS or if you know a good HR advisor.
This isn't my field, please explore it beyond my hunch.

Yes my school told me that until I quoted the equality act at them.

It is not legal.

Many schools say it but they cannot enforce it and if they try you can get them into a whole world of shit.

Depends, will you get full company sick pay or have you used a lot of paid sick days already ?

You say your work in the NHS, aren’t they are pretty good with salaried sick pay?

Are you on probation? Could that be the there a reason they don’t want to trigger the sickness procedures?

It's sick leave, end of. Join a union today if you're not in one already - you're going to need it.

To clarify:

If you are disabled by the equality act definition ie you have a physical or mental impairment that has a long term (usually defined at over 6 months) impact on your ability to do activities

Then it is straight up illegal for your workplace not to allow you to take time off for medical appointments, pre-booked or otherwise.

I can't find the equality act section right now but I actually put together a standard email because so many employers seemed to think they had the right to enforce this policy.

www.scope.org.uk/advice-and-support/sick-leave/

Op, if this has been affecting you for more than six months you can inform your employer that you consider yourself disabled and then any sick leave relating to your disability by law has to be disregarded (does not count) for the sickness triggers.

To me it’s suspected endometriosis/adenomyosis but doctors have been reluctant to investigate until recently where I’ve been more pushy with them.
I had an occu health assessment when I first started which does say “X May continue to have medical appointments whilst in work time and management may wish to allow a ‘reasonable adjustment’ under the remit of Equality Act 2010 for X to attend”.
But thank you. I will seek advice from ACAS