The sick time policy

Before the year gets much older, small businesses that don’t have a policy on sick time need to come up with one. That involves more than picking a number of days to give employees; it also means thinking about what to do if workers run through their allotment, or if someone is abusing the system.

There are good reasons for formulating a sick time policy and making sure all your employees are aware of it. Most important is that workers need to know what they can expect. And you as an employer are protected when you have a written policy.

You’re actually not required under federal or state law to pay employees when they miss work because of illness. But you’ll be a better and more competitive employer for doing so.

Before you start, you should be familiar with federal and state laws that affect your sick time policy, especially the federal Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993, which requires employers to grant unpaid sick leave under certain conditions. The Department of Labor has a fact sheet on the act on its Web site, www.dol.gov/ esa/regs/compliance/whd/ whdfs28.htm.

In deciding how much sick time to give, you need to consider the demands of your business. For example, will you need to pay overtime or hire a temporary worker to replace one who’s absent? If you’ve already had absenteeism problems, you’ll want to write a policy that helps you address them.

You can find help in putting together a sick time policy in the Small Business Administration article “Managing Employee Benefits,” available at www.sba.gov/library/pubs/ pm-3.doc.

Books on managing employees are another resource. Among them is the “Create Your Own Employee Handbook,” published by Nolo Press, which has a simple template for a sick leave policy. Nolo also offers some tips on its Web site, www.nolo.com.

SCORE, the organization of retired executives who advise small business owners, has human resources experts who can help if you’re on a tight budget.

Enforcing sick leave policies is challenging for employers.

Susan Norton, a labor lawyer in Florida, said it’s a good idea to let employees know even before they’re hired what your policy is.

“If you tell them what the rules are and that you’ll enforce them, people will either do it or find something else,” she said.

Moreover, Norton said, pre-employment drug testing can help you avoid a problem with sick time later on if the applicant has a substance abuse problem.

One of the biggest headaches for an employer has to do with the staffer who frequently calls in sick but doesn’t seem to be ill. In such a case, you are allowed under the U.S. Americans With Disabilities Act to require the employee to get a doctor’s note that states the staffer has been under medical care.

Of course, many staffers genuinely are sick and can go through their sick time either because they’ve had a run of bad colds or several bouts of the flu, or have a chronic condition such as asthma. In many of these cases, an employee’s job is likely to be protected by the medical leave act, although it’s up to you whether you pay them after they’ve run out of sick days. If it’s a valued employee, it will behoove you to be flexible.

With no-fault time off, employees can take their days for whatever they need. But when that time runs out, so will the pay, or, if you prefer to make your policy more strict, they could be fired.

Many employers believe that being flexible about paid sick time translates into better work.

At Jackson Spalding, a public relations and marketing firm based in Atlanta, the company has no limit on the number of days a sick staffer can take off with pay, said Gene Crosby, director of office operations.

He said the company, which has 38 employees, hasn’t had a problem with abuse of that policy during its 10-year history.

“It starts with the caliber of people you bring into a firm,” Crosby said. “We bring in great professionals who know that sick days are really sick days.”

Building Small Business is a weekly column on the topic by the Associated Press.