Supporting Attendance FAQ

Attempt to contact the employee directly in the first instance. This should be followed by a letter to the employee requesting that contact is made as a matter of urgency.
A template letter is available here in Supporting Attendance Toolkit – My NL. These letters can also be sent to Teaching Staff.
Should the employee fail to make contact after sending the letter please contact the Employment & Policy Team for further advise on the next steps.

If an absence is more than 7 calendar days in duration you are required to provide a fit note. Fit notes are signed off by a GP or other treating healthcare professional who is responsible for your care plan i.e. nurse, doctor, occupational therapist, physiotherapist. The fit note can advise that: you are ‘not fit for work’ or you ‘may be fit for work’ with temporary adjustments.

Employees that have access to Myself, Self-certification for sickness absence of 7 days or less will be an online process. The sickness recorded electronically through Myself will capture key data currently recorded on the paper self-certificate form. This removes the need to complete a paper form as it would be a duplication of the existing process.

Employees who do not have access to mySelf will still require to complete a paper self- certificate and they can obtain this from their line manager.

Attempt to contact the employee directly in the first instance (including a home visit if appropriate). This should be followed by a letter to the employee requesting that contact is made as a matter of urgency.
Further guidance can be sought from the Employment & Policy Team.

Contact should be made on the 1st, 4th & 7th day of absence . Thereafter you must maintain contact with line manager at intervals of no more than 7 days or another agreed period.

Reporting absence when going off sick or returning should be reported to the following contacts:

Katherine Jack – 07929 016731
Maria Colquohoun – 07973 661326
Hannah McBurnie – 07583 129801.

Where the absence extends beyond 7 calendar days, on the 8th day you will require to submit a Doctor’s Statement of Fitness for Work (Fit Note) to your line manager or designated absence officer and continue to submit these as required throughout the period of sickness absence.

The line manager will be able to view dates of fit notes that have already been submitted for employees on MyTeam/Absence/Sickness Certification details. A guidance on how to record and update fit notes is available here.

An employee who falls sick during the course of annual leave will be regarded as being on sick leave from the date the fit note is signed by a Medical Practitioner and will be able to recover their annual leave provided this is submitted to his/her manager. An employee must have followed the notification procedures, and a ‘back-dated’ fit note will only be accepted in exceptional circumstances.

If an employee falls sick prior to a period of approved leave commencing and they have complied with the Council’s normal arrangement for notification and certification of sickness, they can reclaim and re-assign such a period of leave. The employee is not required to provide a ‘fit note’ for this purpose.

Yes, an employee can go on holiday as long as their GP supports this, and they discuss it with their manager. The employee must maintain contact with line manager at intervals of 7 days or another agreed period. Employees will remain on sickness absence during the period of the holiday.

If the employee’s total absence for the calendar year exceeds 3 months, they will be due to have their annual leave entitlement abated.
For further guidance and where appropriate, to have the employees revised entitlement calculated, please contact the People Helpdesk via myNL Portal using the People Helpdesk General Enquiry Form .

If your period of absence falls during a period of school holidays, you may be entitled to a proportion of annual leave back.
On your return to work, please contact Peoples Operations via the myNL Portal using the Peoples Operations General Enquiry form and they will calculate what proportion of annual leave you are due back.

A formal attendance review meeting must be held with the employee when one or more of the following triggers are met:

– 3 periods of sickness absence in a rolling 12-month cycle (for teaching staff this is 6 months)

– 8 days or more cumulative absence* in a rolling 12-month cycle (*Cumulative absence refers to the total number of days absent accrued over more than one period of absence i.e. not one absence of 8 days) – (for teaching staff this is 4%)

– or a continuous absence of 2 working weeks.

The purpose of this meeting is to discuss the reason for meeting a trigger, the employees absence levels and whether any further follow up action is required. If a formal period of monitoring is put in place, this should be confirmed to the employee in writing.
For further guidance, please see the SA05 – Short and Long Term Absence Stages or the Supporting Your Attendance for Teachers & Associated Professionals page.

Meet the employee initially to find out what support they feel they need. The manager should do as much as possible to accommodate any adjustments required on a temporary basis (this will depend on what is possible in the context of the service being delivered and the employees’ role). You may wish to consider a referral to occupational health to determine what adjustments may be required . It is important that the manager agrees any adjustments in writing.
Further guidance can be sought from the Employment & Policy Team.

In general, a referral will normally but not always be made after 4 weeks continuous absence or when the absence is attributable to stress (in cases of work-related stress the stress assessment should be completed prior to a referral being made) or where the timescale for return to work is known in advance i.e. post operative recovery.
It is essential that a full discussion has taken place with the employee prior to making a referral
Further information on the Occupational Health service and referral process can be found here.

If an employee reports for work and then goes home sick within 2 hours of their start time this will be recorded as a sickness absence and will count towards absence triggers.
If an employee reports for work and then goes home sick after working more than 2 hours this should be recorded as “other absence”. Whilst this will not count towards absence triggers managers should monitor any patterns of non-attendance and discuss any concerns with the employee at an early stage.

It is the responsibility of line managers to record this on myTeam, they will be able to view dates of all FARMs for employees on myTeam/Absence/Absence stage details.

Guidance on how to do this is available here.

Confirmation of the agreed phased return should be included on the FARM/Capability outcome letter. A phased return should not last any longer than 4 weeks (6 weeks if supported by Occupational Health). Further information on phased returns is contained in Supporting Attendance Policy Section 4.1 of the Supporting Attendance Policy and Procedure or Section 8.5 of the Managing Attendance Policy for Teachers.

The discipline process should not be used for addressing poor attendance, unless it relates to a Teacher or Associated Professional or a conduct related matter such as poor timekeeping or failure to follow the notification and certification procedures. Further guidance on when it is appropriate to use the discipline process can be sought from the Employment & Policy Team.

Managers must ensure that when an employee has advised that their sickness absence is work related the relevant field is completed on iTrent. Instructions on how to complete this field are available here.

Managers must not automatically record work related sickness absence as an Industrial Injury. An absence will only be recorded as an Industrial injury once this has been established through an incident investigation by the Safety & Wellbeing Team.

Further guidance on the Industrial Injury process can be found here.

Physiotherapy referrals are now made by line managers through the occupational health portal using the Physiotherapy Request Form (the access password for this is NLC.PHY_REQ). Line Managers will receive any updates and physiotherapy reports via email. Any queries about submitted referrals should be sent to NLphysio@northlan.gov.uk .
Further information on the aim of this service is available here on Health & Wellbeing Support for Employees – My NL.

Managers must ensure that when an employee’s reason for their sickness absence changes during the course of the absence i.e from stress to depression the relevant field is completed on iTrent. Instructions on how to complete this field are contained in Section 6.4 of the myTeam User Guide v19 May 2024.
Reasons for absence should be clearly detailed. The reason ‘Non-specified’ should not be used and employees must be asked for a reason.

In the first instance any health & safety incident or accident that has occurred during the employees working day must be recorded on the Councils Incident Reporting and Information System CIRIS.
If the injury resulted in an absence from work this would also require to be recorded on CIRIS. Managers must not automatically record work related sickness absence as an Industrial Injury on iTrent. An absence will only be recorded as an Industrial injury once this has been established through an incident investigation by the Safety & Wellbeing Team
Further guidance on the Industrial Injury process can be found here

Information on sick pay entitlements for both Teaching and Non-Teaching staff can be found here at Sick Pay Entitlements – My NL.

Please contact the People Helpdesk by raising a case on the myNL Portal using the People Helpdesk General Enquiry Form, or where you are not yet live on the Portal, and they will be able to assist you.
Reporting Managers will also receive Half Pay/No Pay notification emails from the Employment & Policy Team advising them of when an employee is due to commence half pay or no pay. These will be sent on a fortnightly, 4 weekly or monthly basis depending on the employees pay run.

Please contact the People Helpdesk via myNL Portal using the People Helpdesk General Enquiry Form.

If you have exhausted or no entitlement to occupational and/or statutory sick pay the council will issue you with a SSP1 Form that you can use to claim any payments or benefits you may be entitled to through the DWP.
You can obtain information and advice on benefits and debt including help with claim forms, challenging benefit decisions and benefit checks from North Lanarkshire Councils Tackling Poverty Team by emailing TPTeam@northlan.gov.uk, calling 01698 332 551 or visiting www.northlanarkshire.gov.uk/benefits-and-money.
Further information on money and income worries, debt advise etc can also be found here Cost of Living – My NL.

Please access mySelf to check you have ended your period of sickness absence.
If you have entered an end date, please contact the People Helpdesk for further assistance via myNL Portal using the People Helpdesk General Enquiry Form.

Please access mySelf to check you have ended your period of sickness absence.
If you have entered an end date, please contact the People Helpdesk via myNL Portal using the People Helpdesk General Enquiry Form for further assistance.