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Capability Issue - unable to travel

Nicola

| 0 Posts

4 Sep, 2019 12:15

An employee has a back issue and is unable to attend meetings or commute to the office, due to the pain. We have allowed them to work from home for a short period of time however this is unsustainable in the longer term due to requirements for the person to attend external meetings etc. We have encouraged the employee to seek medical advice on the issue; as there seems little improvement. 

What are our options - should we advise the employee that the home working is unsustainable and they should be on sickness leave?

and/or consider the options in re-focusing the work programme, to allow the employee to work part of the week at home (undertaking work that could be done there) with the rest of time being classed as sickness absence?

And in the meantime seek OH advice on the likely timescales for improvement/ recommendations for support etc. 

Advice appreciated. 

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  • Keith

    | 0 Posts

    4 Sep, 2019 12:47

    If you are allowing the employee to work from home you must ensure that the working environment is not causing any harm or damage to her back. Are you? One assumes she is probably sat on a dining chair etc that isn't adjustable, with a table at the wrong height etc. That would be the first thing I would be clarifying.

    If you are comfortable (pun intended :-) ) that she can work from home safely and you have enough work for her to do, and it will not delay her return to work then all is well and good. Although some organisations would still insist she should be recovering not working.

    If you run out of work then she is sick.

    If the condition falls under the Equality Act (unlikely at this stage from what you have said but possible) then you have a legal obligation to make all reasonable adjustments to allow her to carry on working which MAY include working from home (if its safe to do so) , adjusting work tasks etc etc.

    I would say at this stage that a medical report (on her long term prognosis and also impact of working from home) are vital and urgent.