Jan 8, 2014
sick day from work to require second opinion
Ever take a sick day from work? Of course you have. Who hasn't? Ever taken a day off and called it a sick day? No? Well maybe your boss does not believe you and thinks you called in sick jjust because you don't want to use up your vacation days? You think that's what the doctor's letter is for - to assure your boss that you were really sick? Well, he might not be so assured. After all, maybe your doctor is in cahoots with you and signed a sick day letter just because you asked him to...
A Knesset Committee is considering approving a new rule that would give your employer the right to demand a second doctor's examination by the doctor of your employer's choice. When you submit your doctor's letter confirming your illness, it will not have details of what you were sick with - for reasons of medical privacy. The employer will be able to send you to another doctor, of his choice, to confirm that you were really sick.
It seems the law already allows employers to demand a second doctors visit, but only when the first doctor is a private, non-Kupa, doctor.
Some oppose it saying that just like the suspicion is that an employee is getting a sick note form a friendly doctor when he is really just on vacation, maybe the employer will send him to a friendly doctor who will say the employee was not really sick and wipe away his real sick days.
Another reason for opposition is that this puts all doctors under suspicion of being involved in fraud. If a doctor is suspected of lying or fraud, he can be investigated and dealt with, but pitting doctor against doctor has both ethical and professional problems...
(source: NRG)
Another problem is who will pay the second doctor? A person generally cannot change doctors in the middle of a quarter. I am not quite sure how the details work, but if I have already seen one specific doctor in this period, I cannot go to another doctor (of the same field) in the same period. I think there are exceptions, and maybe an employer's insistence will have to be made an official exception that would allow you to see the second doctor.
A Knesset Committee is considering approving a new rule that would give your employer the right to demand a second doctor's examination by the doctor of your employer's choice. When you submit your doctor's letter confirming your illness, it will not have details of what you were sick with - for reasons of medical privacy. The employer will be able to send you to another doctor, of his choice, to confirm that you were really sick.
It seems the law already allows employers to demand a second doctors visit, but only when the first doctor is a private, non-Kupa, doctor.
Some oppose it saying that just like the suspicion is that an employee is getting a sick note form a friendly doctor when he is really just on vacation, maybe the employer will send him to a friendly doctor who will say the employee was not really sick and wipe away his real sick days.
Another reason for opposition is that this puts all doctors under suspicion of being involved in fraud. If a doctor is suspected of lying or fraud, he can be investigated and dealt with, but pitting doctor against doctor has both ethical and professional problems...
(source: NRG)
Another problem is who will pay the second doctor? A person generally cannot change doctors in the middle of a quarter. I am not quite sure how the details work, but if I have already seen one specific doctor in this period, I cannot go to another doctor (of the same field) in the same period. I think there are exceptions, and maybe an employer's insistence will have to be made an official exception that would allow you to see the second doctor.
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At some point you just have to say if the guy is faking sick, he'll lose his job for other reasons anyway.
ReplyDeleteSo the guy has to stay sick long enough to visit the second doctor?
ReplyDeleteAre there enough doctors in the country that they can waste their time checking up on each other to resolve someone else's workplace dispute?
Doctors are allowed to be used as guarantors for passports because if they lie they can lose their license. The risk far out weighs any kickback they can receive from lying about a patient being sick.
ReplyDeleteThere is a bigger issue. If doctors aren't trustworthy enough to confirm that someone is sick, how can we trust them to tell us who to vote for?
lol
DeleteHysterical.
DeleteYou're funny.
DeleteThe current law requiring doctors notes is already unfair. I was recently with fever, likely just a virus that wiped me out for a day or two. I had no desire or energy to have to get to a doctor just for a note saying ai was ill and needed to be in bed--when all I needed was to rest up in bed!!! Requiring me to get dressed, drive over to a clinic, infecting other people in order to get a doctors note is rediculous.
ReplyDeleteI am not sure "unfair" is the right word, though it is definitely inconvenient at times, like in the situation you described.
Deletefrom the employers perspective your desire is "unfair" - he pays you to work and you take a day off to lay around or take care of errands or whatnot and just dont want it to come off your vacation days. maybe you are sick, maybe not. I dont think it is unfair of the employer to ask for a doctors note, though sometimes it is inconvenient. some offices, usually smaller offices, are not strict about the doctors note and are mroe likely to trust you, but in a large office with a full HR department, it is more likely a docs note will be required.
Who in Israel gets separate sick days and vacation days?!
ReplyDeleteThis is absurd....
You can ONLY read this kind of asinine, out-of-touch BS from Knesset members.
most employees get separate sick days and vacation days. employees usually get 10 or 12 vacation days per year, and then it increases each year. sick days is more complicated. the law says the first sick day is unpaid, the second sick day is 50% paid, and the third is 75% paid (or something like that), but many employers give x number of sick days per year.
DeleteEvery worker in Israel gets his sick days and vacation days- if not he will sue his boss and win. If not immediately, then when he leaves the work. Problem is, as an owner of a small business, I can attest that doctors give sick letters to their patients on demand. My worker is a good guy. Usually. But when he had a headache for emotional reasons, his doctor gave him four days off to relax. What happened to Acamol?
ReplyDeleteStupid. It sounds like a way for employers to make sure that they never have to pay for an employee's sick days.
ReplyDeleteYeah, some employees misuse sick days. Usually it only happens when there is a really good reason for it and only once in a while. Other employees (and sometimes those of the first group, too) come in anyways when they're sick..especially if they're teachers, because a teacher absent = students who don't learn = curriculum that gets messed up...
Why do we have to legalize a boss taking away EVERY employee's sick days, just because "he didn't find enough proof" and he doesn't want to pay up?