Short notice isolation

[nickv]

What are people with small buisness 1-10 employees doing when an employee has to self isolate at no notice obvisouly
When one has a small business with productive staff it can have huge impact on the business
Are you paying them in full
Are you asking them if they want to take it as annual leave on full pay
Are you putting them on Furlough
Are they on sick pay

How will you handle the situation when furlough ends
Apologies if this has already been covered

[WonkeyDonkey]

I work for a massive multinational. No pay with no option of taking it as furlough or holiday when asked to self isolate because of close contact. Full pay if told to self isolate because of a positive test.

I am a fully disposable and easily replaceable worker though.

[Takemeaway]

nickv said:

What are people with small buisness 1-10 employees doing when an employee has to self isolate at no notice obvisouly
When one has a small business with productive staff it can have huge impact on the business
Are you paying them in full
Are you asking them if they want to take it as annual leave on full pay
Are you putting them on Furlough
Are they on sick pay

How will you handle the situation when furlough ends
Apologies if this has already been covered

Tricky one as it's only maybe 7 working days maximum... as a small business it's only happened once so far to us and we ended up paying full pay and not claiming anything back - if there were to be an increase in staff isolating i'd probably furlough them and claim back the 70% which it currently is.

I guess a lot depends on how much you value your staff and how loyal they are to your business!

[Triple Six]

Small business here of roughly 12 employees, only a handful of us could WFH in the event of being told to isolate.

It happened to us once end of last year, we paid the week he was off in full. It's mostly give and take as the staff have been brilliant and nobody takes the mick, but still a costly exercise.

[StevieBee]

nickv said:

What are people with small buisness 1-10 employees doing when an employee has to self isolate at no notice obvisouly
When one has a small business with productive staff it can have huge impact on the business
Are you paying them in full
Are you asking them if they want to take it as annual leave on full pay
Are you putting them on Furlough
Are they on sick pay

How will you handle the situation when furlough ends
Apologies if this has already been covered

I think it's exactly scenarios like this that will be the root of much robust discussion surrounding enforcing employees to be vaccinated.

[monkfish1]

nickv said:

What are people with small buisness 1-10 employees doing when an employee has to self isolate at no notice obvisouly
When one has a small business with productive staff it can have huge impact on the business
Are you paying them in full
Are you asking them if they want to take it as annual leave on full pay
Are you putting them on Furlough
Are they on sick pay

How will you handle the situation when furlough ends
Apologies if this has already been covered

Depends if you believe its a real event or not.

As kids have found out, stick the test in a grapefruit and, voila, positive test, 10 days off.

If staff are doing it to take time off, dont pay them. Otherwise, use your judgement.

[deckster]

StevieBee said:

nickv said:

What are people with small buisness 1-10 employees doing when an employee has to self isolate at no notice obvisouly
When one has a small business with productive staff it can have huge impact on the business
Are you paying them in full
Are you asking them if they want to take it as annual leave on full pay
Are you putting them on Furlough
Are they on sick pay

How will you handle the situation when furlough ends
Apologies if this has already been covered

I think it's exactly scenarios like this that will be the root of much robust discussion surrounding enforcing employees to be vaccinated.

Definitely this. In two weeks time, this will become a personal choice. If an employee doesn't get vaccinated, then they are making a choice to take the risk of being told to isolate and in that case I would see no reason to pay them.

ETA: actually as per announcement just now, it's six weeks i.e. from August 16th. The rest still stands though

Edited by deckster on Tuesday 6th July 12:48

[Triple Six]

deckster said:

ETA: actually as per announcement just now, it's six weeks i.e. from August 16th. The rest still stands though

This is going to be a massive sigh of relief for us, luckily almost all of the workforce has now had both doses.

[RammyMP]

Ive just come out of isolation but luckily I can easily work from home. I kept getting emails from the Test and trace saying if I was on low income and can’t work from home I may be eligible for the £500 through the test and trace support scheme. Might be an option if they can claim it.

[Jockman]

My understanding is that will be regarded as an abuse of the furlough scheme to use it for isolating staff. We were warned not to do this by our HR advisers who also pointed out that any discovery during a check up could result in us losing all furlough payments.

Essentially the furlough scheme cannot be used if work is available.

[StevieBee]

Jockman said:

Essentially the furlough scheme cannot be used if work is available.

Morally that is correct and is certainly the 'spirit' of the scheme but I think that the only legal restriction is that someone Furloughed cannot be paid by the firm other than the 20% top up regardless of anything else.

[LaurasOtherHalf]

StevieBee said:

Jockman said:

Essentially the furlough scheme cannot be used if work is available.

Morally that is correct and is certainly the 'spirit' of the scheme but I think that the only legal restriction is that someone Furloughed cannot be paid by the firm other than the 20% top up regardless of anything else.

It has been legally confirmed for a number of weeks now that despite government protests, Furlough can be used and claimed for staff members who need to isolate.