Off sick for years

[BoredandStuck]

Someone I work with has been off work sick for over two and a half years now. That seems a really long time without them being sacked or let go. Has anyone else come across anything similar or longer?

Well depends doesn't it?
I have a colleague who hasn't worked for 18 months battling bowel cancer. He would no doubt rather be at work.

My company has an insurance which is indefinite if you are off sick and can last until retirement age.
Your company should be backfilling her role so this is a company issue you need to raise not an issue with the employee.

All the sanctimonious "mind your business"...
It is your business - at the very minimum because it illustrates how the income protection insurance works, so you can take it into account when staying/changing jobs.

My SIL was off for about 5 years after a cancer diagnosis. She was paid via an insurance scheme so her employer wasn't out of pocket. It meant my brother was entitled to the death in service payment when she died very young, leaving two young children behind.
I would imagine during that time someone else would have been employed to cover her work.

I had an ex colleague like this - did it for at least 4 years. Between 6 and 9 months off every year. On 6 months full pay, 6 months half pay.

Would come back claiming to be no better but had run out of money - I just used to think well if you can be at work now why couldn;t you be at work 3 or 4 months ago if you're just the same.

Would spend 4-6 weeks phased return, then have loads of leave to take and then go off sick again.

I had to do her job as well as my own. It affected my mental health to the point of me having a break down which my managers knew about. I have spent years working 12 hour days to get the work done.

Anyway they eventually paid her off but haven't replaced her so I'm no better off! Though I am now at least using AI to do a lot of my job which helps.

She may well be being managed out in one way or another, it’s way more complicated if you have income protection in place, but generally the company will be doing it by the book as if they screw up it will cost a fortune. And the rest of the team won’t be hearing any updates. You’d need to be very careful about recruiting a replacement as their job will be protected, it can be done but if you can avoid it’s safer TBH.

IME because managers are reluctant to start capability proceedings. They are worried about potential claims for discrimination, etc especially if someone is going to state that their long term condition is a disability. Even HR get nervous. I don't understand it because someone can be got rid of on capability grounds even if disabled. Just follow the process, it's not hard. I'm all for supporting a genuine temporary issue but absolutely if someone over a period of years demonstrates they can't do the job they need to go.

A relative had a coworker like this, but it was a bit different as she’d be off sick, come back for a little bit and then be off sick again. He worked there for 2 years and when he left she was still kicking around.

We saw her every Friday at spoons though lol.

When you get short term Dr certificates it's not possible to backfill. If a certificate is for 2 months but keeps getting extended for short timeframes it's nearly impossible to get backfill staff as it's too uncertain for them. They tend to have frequent turnover (which is understandable) and then the team is stressed training another new person. If you only have funding for one role, you can't fill it on an ongoing basis while it has a substantive occupant who is off on sick leave.

It’s income protection to the receiver though, not insurance against loss to the company.

theyll have a blanket policy (they’re expensive) and a small element is going back. Just like death in service insurance

You never know. They might have been a contributing factor as to why she was off

You can raise the issue of your/your team's workload during your performance review, surely? But if they're still paying this person's salary then they may not be able to afford to hire anyone new to replace them.

Do you even know why she’s off ? Could be a serious illness ie cancer or something fgs keep your nose out and speak to your manager about your work if your struggling, instead of being concerned about other people’s business.

Oh go away

This. ^ Nobody would be happy with this, and everyone would be annoyed about it, and question it. Two and a half years - or more - on the sick may be allowed, but I don't think it should be. After one year, people should be notified that they will be made redundant unless they come back within 6 weeks. (IMO!)

It's very unfair for everyone else to have to pick up the slack. Yes, management are partly to blame, but they very likely don't want to fork out for someone whilst having to pay the absent person. And the person is very likely getting pretty much full pay, because they wouldn't be off this long if they just got Statutory Sick Pay. (SSP.)

I know a number of people who are hourly paid/don't get paid if they don't work, and if they are off sick for even 2-3 weeks, they only get SSP, and start to suffer financially pretty quickly. Most will go back by the 3rd week. (Obviously there are a few exceptions.) People who get paid full pay on the sick take much more time off. Funny that isn't it?

whats the bet it’s related to mental health and you also work in the public sector?

This 👆
With bells 🔔 on

The insurance company will be paying out and dealing with all the sickness management (and as you can imagine - they don't pay out and forget to manage the situation). It will not be costing the employer much, they will no longer be liable for salary - they should be using the saving to recruit a temporary member of staff to cover.

No it's not hard, you can't do it legally. There maybe other ways to let them go, such as ill health early retirement, or being paid off in a similar way to redundancy. Or redundancy its self if the company is going through this process. Or they may decide to leave. Or there might be cases where they didn't really need to be off sick and a doctor didn't agree to keep providing sick notes. You can't just sack someone for being ill though.

I have worked at my workplace for over 20 years and there are people who are still on sick who went long term sick the year after I started! Different contracts now so not as common but does still happen. It doesn’t affect my work load though because after 6 months they are replaced and in the unlikely event they come back we will be over staffed and the company just not replace retirees/job leavers until the staff quota returns to its correct level. I feel very fortunate to work for a company who cares for its employees! Its a large, wealthy company though so they can afford to do it

You can if they can’t return to their duties. There is a process of course, but that is a legitimate reason for dismissal

Of course you would!

Not if this means that they can no longer receive their contractual benefit of the permanent health insurance. So that’s how situations like this occur - it’s a sort of tripartite arrangement where the insurer tries to cease the claim by all legitimate methods, and the employer can’t end the contract.

Any team which has picked up the workload of an absent team member for two years without complaint or loss of productivity has simply proved to the management that the additional person in the team is an unnecessary expense.

Don't expect her to be replaced when she is finally sacked or retires. If she returns and stays, don't be surprised if there's a redundancy shortly afterwards.

My public sector employer sent around an email saying they can sack us if we are sick, even if we are genuinely really sick, and regardless of how long we have been sick.