Watch our short video on medical appointments for more detail
There’s no statutory entitlement to time off for medical appointments
What does your policy say?
Lots of appointments might indicate underlying health concerns
We get asked a lot about medical appointments – an employee has requested some time off for a medical appointment. It’s their sixth appointment in the last two months. Can you refuse them?
There’s no statutory right for time off for appointments and it can be really hard to arrange medical and dental appointments in and around your work, but it’s not unreasonable as an employer to request that appointments be taken early morning or late in the afternoon so as to disrupt the day less, but it isn’t always possible.
You can give your employee the option of taking the time off unpaid. They can make the time up later, or they can take annual leave.
And its time to review your policy to make sure you give your employees guidance on what they should do if they need appointments.
Most importantly, keep records of all these requests. Six appointments in two months could indicate hat your employee has an underlying medical condition that you may need to know about. It would be well worth having a chat with them just to see if everything is OK.
Do you have questions about medical appointments?
Give us a call at CUBE HR, we’ll be happy to advise you and we have policies and templates available to meet every HR need.
Why not check out our other blog on the same topic Time Off For Appointments – 3 Things You Should Know
You can also watch a range of other videos on our YouTube channel
