Sick, day 1–7

Read more about what you as manager need to do when one of your employees is on sick leave for between one and seven days, regardless of whether the sick leave is part-time or full-time.

Below you will find a list of the content on the page. Click on the links to read more.

Initiate and keep in contact with the employee

Sick leave begins with an employee reporting sickness to you as their immediate manager. The notification of sickness should come directly from the employee via telephone, text message or email. For more information, see Sickness checklist – employee.

Initiate and keep in contact with the employee

If you have not spoken with the employee personally, follow up with a phone call no later than day three to reconcile the situation and establish a dialogue early on about when the employee may be able to return to work.

Early and regular communication with a sick employee has a large impact on how successful and rapid a return to work will be.

If it is already clear that the sick leave may be long term, it is important that you as manager book regular status checks (perhaps once a week) with your employee to keep abreast of how the employee is feeling and what the prognosis is for a return to work. For more information, see Contact call (guide).

Assessment, day 1–7

Entitlement to sick pay

According to the Swedish Sick Pay Act (lagen om sjuklön – 1991:1047), it is you as manager who should assess entitlement to sick pay. To be entitled to sick pay, the employee's work capacity must be reduced due to sickness, in relation to the employee's regular work. Sick pay is variable – that is, it can be paid at any percentage.

For the first seven says of a period of sick leave, no medical certificate is usually required, but if there are special grounds (chapter 3, section 3 of the general agreement on salaries and benefits – Villkorsavtalet), you as manager may require an employee to submit a medical certificate earlier than day eight. This could apply, for example, if there is suspicion that someone is fraudulently claiming to be sick, such as when an employee 'threatens' to be sick if they are not permitted to be free from work. This should not be confused with a day one medical certificate. This is applicable only on isolated occasions and not during an agreed period.

If you need advice and support in making the assessment, please contact your HR specialist/advisor at the HR Office.

Repeated short-term sick leave

Take out the report in Primula on the number of times the employee haves been on sick leave; see the guide in the toolbox. If the employee's short-term sick leave exceeds six occasions over a twelve-month period, follow the procedures according to preventative rehabilitation efforts.

Day one medical certificate

According to chapter 7, section 3 of the Villkorsavtalet agreement, the employer is permitted to require that an employee verify their absence with a medical certificate from the first day off sick. This is a measure that may be taken only occasionally and is determined by the HR manager. If you are considering using this measure, contact your HR specialist/advisor at the HR Office.

Adjustments or work travel allowance

Already at this stage, in consultation with the employee, you can investigate whether temporary adjustments would make it possible for the employee to be able to work in spite of sickness.

Examples of this could involve adjustments to regular work assignments, adapting working hours, different work assignments or work from home.

If the sickness prevents the employee from getting to and from work by regular means, you have the possibility of paying compensation for additional costs for travel to and from work instead of sick pay. This compensation is taxable and can only be paid if the employee is on full-time sick leave.

Plan and document

If you assess that the employee will be off sick for a long period of time, make a preliminary plan as soon as possible for what you need to do during different parts of the sick leave period. The rehabilitation calendar can help you with this. Remember to document all important events relating to the case. Feel free to use the Notes template in the toolbox below.