Managing staff wellbeing during an outbreak

Key advice for employers of how to manage staff during the Coronavirus outbreak from our legal experts in the employment law and HR department.

If my employee is in quarantine do I have to pay them sick pay?

Theresa Carling, Partner in our employment law team advising: “If one of your employees tells you that they are required to refrain from work because they have been medically advised to do so by a medical professional then that individual would be entitled to Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) during that period of absence.”

What emergency measures have been put in place?

Theresa added: “Last week Boris Johnson announced there were going to be some emergency measures in legislation for SSP.  In terms of what you would normally expect, you would have to wait 3 waiting days before SSP becomes payable. He announced in his update that SSP should now be payable from day one of any absences but we’re currently still waiting for that legislation to commence an emergency measure.”

I employ lots of parents, what do I do if schools close and my employees have no choice but to stay off work?

Jessica Maine, a Solicitor in our employment law team said: “So you should generally have a policy in your staff handbook dealing with leave of dependents every employee is entitled to unpaid leave so for emergency circumstances where they can’t get child care others are dependent that they need to attend to and they will have their leave but it will be unpaid at that point so it’s always worthwhile for employees to familiarise themselves what they do in those circumstances and just make sure employees are aware as well as to what the situation is.”

For further information from our employment law team, watch the full video of advice here. 

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