Date 24.01.2025
Sickness absence is a major cost for Norwegian companies, and there is a lot to be gained for organisations that have control of the regulations. It’s also important to ensure fair and efficient treatment of employees, while protecting the company from potential pitfalls.
We’ve compiled 10 pieces of advice that employers should know about sick leave.
It’s important that employers follow up on employees on sick leave, as required by law. This follow-up is made easier if the organisation establishes its own follow-up system. This can help you follow the rules for follow-up and get a grip on sickness absence.
The law does not specify how the follow-up should be carried out, so the employer has a great deal of room for manoeuvre in determining the content of a follow-up plan. Feel free to do this together with the employee on sick leave. What is most appropriate will vary from situation to situation.
It’s best for both parties if you quickly follow up on the person on sick leave. There is nothing to stop the employer from following up more quickly than Nav suggests, or what the law requires.
Doctors are important key persons in the follow-up work. It is important to involve them where the follow-up work requires more than the usual discretion from the employer. Although doctors have a duty of confidentiality regarding diagnoses, for example, they are obliged to inform the employer about the employee’s ability to work. The doctor must also attend the meeting held after seven weeks of sick leave.
It’s a good idea to remember not to leave follow-up measures untested. The employee has a duty of co-operation to test their functional ability, i.e. how much they can work. That’s why it’s a good idea to actively involve them in trying out different measures and making demands on an employee on sick leave.
The law states that if an employee on sick leave does not want to co-operate with follow-up measures, this can lead to the loss of sickness benefit from Nav. If Nav decides to discontinue sickness benefit, the employer can also stop payment of sickness benefit. It’s a good idea to have an overview of whether and to what extent the employer pays the difference between salary and sickness benefit from Nav.
If the sick leave lasts for a long time (long-term sick leave), termination may be relevant. There will usually be disagreement between the employer and the employee as to whether the sickness absence constitutes sufficient grounds for dismissal. There will be many questions and issues in such sickness absence cases and it will often be beneficial to seek advice from a lawyer.
If the sick leave ends in dismissal, it is important for the employer to be able to point to good follow-up of the employee and various measures for adaptation during the period of sick leave.
In order to assess whether the follow-up of the employee on sick leave has been good enough, it is beneficial to document the follow-up work in writing. This can be done by taking minutes of all meetings and summarising the content of telephone conversations with the employee in an email immediately after the conversation.
There are clear requirements for the employer to facilitate the work situation of an employee on sick leave. However, the employer is not required to create a new position to avoid dismissing an employee on long-term sick leave if there is no real need for this. Nor is it the case that the employer must require other employees to change positions in order for the employee on sick leave to find more suitable work. This is a consequence of the employer’s right of management limiting the scope of the adaptation obligation.
Please contact Advokatfirmaet Hjort for further advice or more information on the subject.
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