Sickness, Absence and Holiday Leave
This collection is for employers and HR teams managing employee sickness absence, Statutory Sick Pay, return to work processes, and holiday administration.
It brings together policies, guidance, forms, records, staged letters, SSP forms, and annual leave documents. The documents are grouped by practical employer task, making it easier to find the right template for the issue being handled.
Sickness absence policies and return to work documents
Sickness Policies and Guidance Templates provides the core framework for managing employee sickness absence fairly and consistently, including policy wording and employer guidance.
For routine absence administration, Absence Records and Return to Work includes sickness monitoring documents, self-certification and absence records, unauthorised absence letters, and return to work forms and letters.
Long-term sickness and frequent absence management
Managing Long-Term and Frequent Sickness contains the documents needed where absence becomes ongoing, repeated, or more serious.
This section includes a dedicated sickness absence policy and a structured sequence of letters covering employee contact during sickness absence, requests for medical examination, formal review meetings, outcome letters, frequent short-term sickness absence, and prolonged absence.
SSP forms and holiday entitlement documents
Statutory Sickness SSP Forms contains the statutory forms used when managing employee sickness and SSP administration.
Holiday administration is covered separately in Holiday Entitlement Documents, which includes annual leave request forms, carry-over agreements, letters declining leave, documents for designating leave, and letters dealing with non-return from holiday.
Find the right documents for the issue you are handling
The collection is organised around common employer tasks, including putting sickness absence rules in place, recording absence, managing return to work, handling long-term or frequent sickness absence, dealing with SSP forms, and managing holiday entitlement.
This gives HR teams and managers a quicker route to the documents most relevant to the stage or type of issue they are dealing with.
Sickness, Absence and Holiday Leave is part of Employment. Just £38.50 + VAT provides unlimited downloads from Employment for 1 year.
Frequently Asked Questions
My employee has been off sick for several days. What documents do I need to record the absence and manage their return to work? +
For routine sickness absence, you need a self-certification form (covering the first seven calendar days), a sickness monitoring record and a return to work form or letter for when the employee comes back. If the absence runs to eight days or more, a fit note from a healthcare professional is required instead of self-certification. The Absence Records and Return to Work sub-folder contains all of these documents, including unauthorised absence letters where needed.
Do I have to pay Statutory Sick Pay from the first day of sickness now, and which of my documents need updating? +
Yes, but only for eligible employees whose absence falls under the new rules. Since 6 April 2026, the Employment Rights Act 2025 removed the three waiting days and the lower earnings limit, so eligible employees get SSP from the first day of sickness absence at £123.25 per week, or 80 per cent of average weekly earnings if lower, for up to 28 weeks. The employee must still meet all the other SSP eligibility criteria and must not be caught by an exception. For example, an employee is not eligible if they have received Employment and Support Allowance in the last 85 days. Under the transitional rules, an employee will not be entitled to SSP from 6 April 2026 if their sickness absence started on or before 21 September 2025 and continued without a break until 5 April 2026, and entitlement resumes only after they have returned to work for at least 8 weeks. Any sickness absence policy, SSP procedure or staff handbook still referring to waiting days or the earnings threshold needs updating. The Sickness Policies and Guidance Templates sub-folder provides the policy framework, and the Statutory Sickness SSP Forms sub-folder contains the statutory administration forms.
An employee has now been off sick for several weeks. What process should I follow and what letters do I need? +
Long-term sickness absence is commonly treated as starting at around four weeks. Maintain regular, documented contact, obtain fit notes to cover each period, and consider a medical report or occupational health referral to understand the prognosis and any adjustments needed. Where the condition may amount to a disability under the Equality Act 2010, the duty to make reasonable adjustments applies. Hold formal review meetings, document them and follow up in writing. The Managing Long-Term and Frequent Sickness sub-folder provides a structured sequence of letters for each stage, including contact letters, medical examination requests, formal review meeting letters and outcome letters.
I need to put a sickness absence policy in place. What should it cover and where do I start? +
Cover how and when employees must report absence, self-certification for the first seven days, fit note requirements from day eight, SSP entitlement (now payable from day one following the April 2026 reforms), return to work procedures, management of long-term or frequent absence including trigger points for formal review and the employer's obligations where absence may be linked to a disability under the Equality Act 2010. Start with the Sickness Policies and Guidance Templates sub-folder, which provides the core policy wording and employer guidance.
My employee fell ill during their annual holiday. Can they reclaim those days as sick leave? +
Usually, yes, but the position depends on which holiday is affected. An employee who falls ill during a period of annual leave can choose to take that time as sick leave instead and reschedule the holiday days they lost. The guaranteed statutory right to reclaim or reschedule the time, and to carry it over where it cannot be taken in the same year, attaches to the 4 weeks of EU-derived statutory leave under regulation 13 of the Working Time Regulations 1998. Whether the additional 1.6 weeks or any contractual or enhanced holiday above the statutory minimum can be reclaimed depends on the contract or the employer's policy. GOV.UK confirms that if an employee is ill just before or during their holiday, they can take it as sick leave instead. The employee must follow the employer's normal sickness reporting procedure, including notifying absence and providing a fit note if the illness lasts more than seven consecutive calendar days, including non-working days. The Holiday Entitlement Documents sub-folder includes letters for dealing with requests of this kind and for responding to them as an employer.
How do I manage holiday entitlement for staff, including leave requests, carry-over and employees who do not return from holiday? +
Workers are entitled to 5.6 weeks of paid annual leave a year under the Working Time Regulations 1998 (28 days for a full-time five-day week, pro-rated for part-time staff). Leave accrues from the first day of employment, including during sickness absence. Employers can require notice of leave requests and decline them with proper notice. The Holiday Entitlement Documents sub-folder contains annual leave request forms, carry-over agreements, letters declining leave requests, documents for designating leave periods and letters for dealing with employees who do not return from holiday as expected.
