Has your employer refused OH recommendations?

[adviceneeded25]

Hi all,

Name change for this.

Just out of curiosity, has anyone's employer refused occupational health's recommendations?

I'm nervous my employer will due to we've had conversations recently.

TIA.

We have for 1 staff member, as it was not deemed reasonable by either HR or management.

We have allowed plenty of reasonable adjustments, but not when they're unreasonable or have a negative impact on the business or other staff.

That's understandable.

I have a feeling my recommendations are going to be refused, as what I requested before the meeting, my boss refused.

She said she didn't have the capacity to reduce my hours/WFH an extra day.

Just don't know what to do.

Employers are not bound to follow OH recommendations if they are simply not feasible within the context of your working environment or role. OH usually describes these as reasonable adjustments, rather than absolute Must Do's, and employers can argue they have done all they can.

I would expect most employers to be able to make some reasonable adjustments, wherever possible. But there is a limit. For instance I had one member of staff who had prolonged absences and seemed to think we should continue paying them their full pay as any loss of earnings impacted their mental health. This was despite a very generous sick leave allowance we had already gone over for them. The OH report recommended we should continue, but we couldn't afford to continue to do so, so we had to look at whether the person could continue to be employed either in their actual role, deployed to another role or take a step down into a more junior role (with accompanying decrease in pay). So in other words, there is a limit to what employers can do and it will depend on the business, the role, the health issues and the impact on your job and how long these have been going on for, and whether they can be reasonably accommodated.

Thank you for this. I completely understand the employers decision on this.

For some context; I have asked to reduce my hours just by a couple per week and they said no. No adjustments have been made at all prior to the OH referral.

For some context; I have asked to reduce my hours just by a couple per week and they said no. No adjustments have been made at all prior to the OH referral.

When you say "I have asked". do you mean you've tried to get reasonable adjustments without going through OH? Did you have supporting reports from your HCP?
If you have a long term condition or disability it's far better to have OH making recommendations as then the impact of work on your health condition can be properly assessed and explained. You've much more chance of being successful that way

So they would have to make a very good case for a business reasons to not allow you to do this. Do you have any issues with your line manager? Are you in a Union?

You don't have to give details on a public forum but the only way I could see the employer being able to do this (without fear of tribunal) would be if you do a job where the shift patterns are such that it would be putting colleagues at risk/under undue pressure or customers/patients at risk or equivalent. Ie where the staffing ratios require a set number of staff on duty at all times.

Or where it would have a material impact on business. Or where it would be hard to backfill your hours.

Most traditional office based employers would at least run a trial period for say 6 weeks. But I have had roles in my team where staff were working 3 days a week and wanted to reduce to two days a week and I had to say no as this would mean the job was almost impossible to deliver.

I hope it goes OK for you, but by the sounds of it even with reasonable adjustments you might want to think about whether this is the right role and employer for you.

As pp said, any employer can refuse to implement OH recommendations, but the reason most don't is it can open a path to tribunal on disability discrimination grounds. So the employer has to be very sure they can evidence that the job can't be done or that the business would be unreasonably impacted if they went ahead. @Thingamebobwotsit gives a good example of a strong case to not implement recommendations. It sounds like what you're asking for would be much more risky to refuse but it depends on the details of your role.