Sick leave and sick pay

Information

In general an employee has no right under employment law in Ireland to be paid while on sick leave. Consequently, it is at the discretion of the employer to decide his/her own policy on sick pay and sick leave, subject to the employee’s contract or terms of employment. Under Section 3 of the Terms of Employment (Information) Act 1994 and 2001 an employer must provide an employee with a written statement of terms of employment within two months of the commencement of the employment. One of the terms referred to in this Act on which the employer must provide information is the terms or conditions relating to incapacity for work due to sickness or injury.

If you have no entitlement in your terms and conditions of employment to pay during sick leave, you may apply for Illness Benefit if you have enough social insurance contributions. If you do not have enough social insurance contributions, you should contact the Community Welfare Officer of your Local Health Office who will assess your situation.

If you are entitled to sick pay, your employer will probably require you to sign over any Illness Benefit payment from the Department of Social Protection to your employer for as long as the sick pay continues.

Often, your contract of employment will place a maximum period of sick pay entitlement in a stated period, for example, one month's sick pay in any 12-month period. Clear rules should be put in place by the employer where an employee is sick and is unavailable for work. For example, it should be clear that if you are sick and unavailable for work, you must contact a specified person by a certain time. Your employer can require you to provide a medical certificate (from your GP or family doctor) when you are on sick leave. For example, you may have to provide a medical certificate if you are out sick for more than 2 consecutive days. The medical certificate should state the nature of your illness and the date you are likely to return to work. If you are likely to be out sick for a longer period, your employer may require you provide weekly medical certificates.

In some circumstances, where an employee has consistently been absent from work (or if through illness is no longer capable of continuing work), employment may be terminated. Employees are protected in certain circumstances in this instance through the unfair dismissals legislation.

If you are unsure about whether or not you are entitled to sick pay, you should consult your contract of employment or speak to your employer.

An employee who does not receive sick pay as per his/her terms of employment may refer a complaint to a Rights Commissioner under the Payment of Wages Act and the relevant complaint form is available on request from this office.

Employment Regulation Orders and Agreements

The following industries are covered by Employment Regulation Orders/Registered Employment Agreements which contain binding regulations regarding sick pay : Agriculture - Brush and Broom - Catering - Contract Cleaning - Construction - Electrical Contractors - Retail Footwear and Drapery (Dublin only) - Hairdressing (Dublin only) - Law Clerks - Provender Milling - Retail Grocery - Security Industry.

Sick leave during public holidays

If you are a full time worker who is on sick leave during a public holiday, you have an entitlement to time off work for the public holiday(s) you missed. If you are a part-time worker on sick leave during a public holiday, you would be entitled to time off work for the public holiday provided you worked for your employer at least 40 hours in the previous 5-week period. 

However you lose your entitlement to public holidays if you have been on sick leave for more than 26 weeks in the case of ordinary illness and 56 weeks in the case of an occupational accident.

Sick leave and annual leave

If you are ill during your annual leave and have a medical certificate for the days you were ill, these sick days will not be counted as annual leave days. Instead, you can use these days as annual leave at a later date.

An employer cannot require you to take annual leave for a certified period of illness. However, illness during the leave year will reduce the total number of hours worked by you and can therefore affect your entitlement to annual leave. While you are on sick leave from work you do not accumulate annual leave entitlement.

Annual leave accumulated before start of sick leave: Many employers insist that you take your annual leave by a particular date, for example, the end of the calendar year. The European Court of Justice has ruled in case C-350/06 that a worker who is on sick leave at the end of the leave year should not lose the right to annual leave which was accumulated before the start of the sick leave. This judgement also applies to a worker who was on sick leave immediately before leaving the employment. This means that the worker would be entitled either to carry over, or receive payment for, annual leave which has been earned but not taken because the worker was on sick leave.

Hospital appointments

If you are in employment and have to take time out of your day to attend a hospital appointment, you may take this time off work. You must have a medical certificate from the hospital for the appointment. However, you are not automatically entitled to pay for this time off while attending hospital appointments. Some employers however will pay their employees while they attend hospital appointments but they are not required by law to do so.  Check with your employer to find out the situation in your workplace.

Remember, your employer cannot force you to take annual leave to attend such hospital appointments.