erm ..... isn't that contrary to employment law ?? (i'm no solicitor by the way )
I know the company looked into it at the time and if i remember rightly by law you didnt have to pay any sick pay at all. Its entirely up to the company`s discretion. The employee can claim statuatory sick pay if they are off long term sick or something.
This is very true, people seem to think they are entitled to sick pay, yes they are, its called Statutory Sick Pay, anything else is voluntary by the company. We have a few employees that have abused the sick pay scheme and have been put on 3 day waiting, i.e. they NEVER get paid for the first 3 days sickness whatever and some have even been excluded from the sick pay scheme altogether for a period of time. One thought he was particularly clever and waited until a final warning ran out and then the next day went sick, he was excluded and even said the immortal line 'you HAVE to pay me sick pay it's the law'
On the flipside I have had so little time off I actually have almost 7 months of sick leave available which is comforting as if something serious happened I wouldn't have to worry about all the times I had a sniffle or it snowed a little bit....