sick pay over Christmas shut down

[PoesyCherish]

I am on long term sick with no view of going back and I'm technically working out my notice - although signed off sick and hoping to renew my fitnote next week. The company closes over the Christmas break and we have to take annual leave. If I were still in work, I was going to have to take some unpaid leave over Christmas as I didn't have enough AL left. As I am off on the sick, will I get paid SSP for the Christmas shutdown rather than it being unpaid leave?

why are you having to take AL if you're sick?

@cloudtree I meant if I wasn't on sick leave I'd be having to take AL plus unpaid leave. My question really is will the company still pay sick pay even if everyone is off?

They should do. You're on sick leave and you don't have to use your annual leave for this (although you will of course only get paid for the sick leave which might be SSP only)

They can't enforce AL if on sick leave. You should be paid ssp

This site confirms what other posters are saying.

That link says this though:

for the days an employee normally works - called ‘qualifying days’

But I wouldn't normally be working those days over Christmas and everyone is off as they shut the site.

They are your normal working days OP. You should get SSP.

Does your contract of employment state whether or not the company pays sick pay during the employee's notice period. Not all do.

I can't see anywhere where it's mentioned @daisychain01

I got the impression you were just on SSP though Poesy? In which case the company can't put a clause in the contract saying they don't pay it during notice - it isn't optional!

Flowery, my understanding is that if the company's Ts and Cs state they won't cover sick pay during a notice period, it means if someone takes up to 4 days off sick (sequential days), they end up not being covered either by the company or by SSP, so get their wages docked. Really mean imo, but sounds like this doesn't apply here as the OP confirms it isn't specified that the company won't pay sick pay, so they must do, which is good news.

Probably off on a tangent but I thought it was worth clarifying

Being in a notice period or not has no impact on entitlement to SSP. Obviously an employer can put conditions around any enhanced sick pay if they choose.