Employment Contracts
Many employers are unsure of their employment law obligations in relation to sick pay. In fact an employee has no statutory right to his or her pay during sick absence except for Statutory Sick Pay. The rights your employee will have to other pay will depend on the employment contract and you may find it helpful to limit the number of days in any year that you will pay. You can do this with any new employees but if you have already got employees and would need to change their contracts, you should take advice from employment solicitors before doing so, or you may run the risk of an employment law claim.
If you do decide to limit the number of days you will pay for sick absence or not to pay at all (other than Statutory Sick Pay) you can retain a discretion to pay your employees. If you do retain the discretion, you need to exercise it consistently so, ideally, you should have always make a note when ever you do exercise this discretion stating your reasons for paying and making sure that they are fair and objective. For example, if one of your employees was injured in a car crash when the car was driven by someone else and they had 4 weeks off work. You could decide to pay them, as it was not their fault and 4 weeks was a long period without salary.