Can the boss force you to go home if you're sick?

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Dear Evil HR Lady,

My company is about to switch over to "paid time off" (PTO) from a more traditional vacation- and sick-time policy. I'm really unhappy about the prospect of people coming into work sick and (of course!) getting me sick, as well. I know this is a very typical problem with PTO workplaces.

Can you tell me about what employees can do if they are in such a situation?

1) Can I ask my company to remove the sick person from the workplace?

2) Is the employer required to remove the sick person from the workplace, as it is now (somewhat) unsafe?

I'm a pretty healthy person, so I should gain a few bonus days because of my relatively good health. I just HATE it when people come in sick, and I know that when we convert to PTO it will be even worse.

I'm not a big fan of PTO precisely because it not only encourages people to come in sick, but also because if you do use those days for sickness you're punished by not being able to take your vacation. And I'm a huge fan of employees using their vacation days for actual rest and relaxation.

Can an employer send you home and charge your PTO bank? I put this question to employment attorney Bryan Cavanaugh, who said:

Yes, an employer can require you to go home because of hacking, sneezing, runny nose, congestion, coughing, and/or vomiting. If we are talking about a common cold, flu, or seasonal allergies, then the company has the right to manage its workforce by excluding sick employees, even if they are ready, willing, and able to work. 

Giving employees paid time time off is generally not required by law (some places in California do have laws, but it isn't the norm). That means companies can generally make their own rules. Plus, if you're sick enough to qualify for protection under the Family and Medical Leave Act or the illness causes a disability covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act, then this advice doesn't apply. (They have their own sets of rules.) 

And just because they can send you home, doesn't mean they must send you home. Cavanaugh said:

Just because an employee is physically able to perform the job does not mean the employer must allow it. An employer can control the safety of its workplace and is required by [the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration] and state workers' compensation acts to provide a safe workplace for its employees. This does not mean that allowing an employee to work near a co-worker with a cold would violate OSHA or other applicable law, but employers should be guided by those laws' principles of creating and maintaining safe and healthful workplaces. Absent some strange circumstance, catching a common cold or flu from a co-worker will not be serious enough to be covered by workers' compensation laws or to violate OSHA.

It make sense that an employer wouldn't want to send home everyone who showed signs of being contagious. Colds last around 8-9 days. And with many illnesses (including some really nasty ones), you're contagious both before and after symptoms appear. We certainly don't want a policy of sending people home because they appear healthy. 

Additionally, there are times that even the most germophobic of us want our coworkers to come to work. When I was doing training, if I called in sick it was a huge problem -- people had traveled from other states to come to my class, so it wasn't like we could just say, "Oh, we'll do this tomorrow!" And while there were other people who were capable of delivering the training, they weren't prepped for a particular session's work, so the students got training that wasn't tailored to their needs or even up to date. (Because, let's be honest, even with someone being cross-trained to do your job, they aren't as up on things as you are.) Plus, someone else had to take over whatever the substitute had scheduled for the day, meaning my absence would have caused a bit of havoc. (When you're teaching a class, you can't just put everyone on pause while you do a two-hour meeting.)

As long as whatever ailment I had wasn't fatal, all involved preferred that I come in and just wash my hands frequently and sanitize the computer keyboard after I was done.

I think you'll agree with me that there are some days in which you'd prefer that your co-workers also came in sick. Sometimes, as long as the person can climb out of bed, you want her there. 

If you're an exempt employee, the employer can dock your PTO if they send you home, but if you're out of PTO, they can't deduct your pay. If you're classified as a non-exempt employee and have run out of PTO, they don't have to pay you.

And even though we tend to think of businesses as these greedy entities that would rather their employees work themselves to death rather than show compassion to the sick, there are many jobs in which the last thing a company wants is for their workers to to show up on the job ill. Sales, for instances. (Would you buy a car from someone who kept having to run to the bathroom? Me neither.) Also, if you're a nurse in the newborn nursery, the rules should be stricter than if you're a night watchman who works alone.

The bottom line is, yes, you company can send you home. But it doesn't have to, and sometimes it will and sometimes it won't. So make sure you wash your hands so you can use your PTO for fabulous vacations instead of alone time with your toilet bowl.

For further reading:

Zero tolerance for tardiness in the workplace
Is your coworker ill or just gaming the system?
Can I ask an employee why he is going to the doctor?

Have a workplace dilemma? Send your questions to [e-mail].

[cme25]

PTO does not work because employees subconsciously think they are using vacation time when they are sick and thus cutting down on their fun time off leading them to come to work sick. There is less illness among employees when there is both vacation and sick time off. However, I really don't know the advantage for an employer to convert to PTO.

[NT014]

wow - I am surprised that people do not like the PTO system. I love it. I can use my time off for anything I want. And since I general do not get sick then its more time for me. Before I would have to pretend to be sick so I could stay at home for a maintenance repair. And if I didn't use my sick days I lost them. But I will confess I at my current job I get 25 PTO days plus holiday a year and can roll a certain amount over to the next year. Its a huge perk! So maybe my view is skewed by that.

[Suzanne Lucas]

Wow! That's awesome. Are you in Europe? Because I would support a PTO program with 25 days in a heartbeat!

[NT014]

I work at a hospital - and yes I know I am spoiled by the PTO system here.

[DebF100]

It's become quite apparent that the people in charge of this website no longer want anyone from outside the USA to read the articles. So I'm off!

[Mike Van Horn]

My wife BJ, HR consultant, sez, "80% of the work is done by people who don't feel well."

[ibsteve2u]

I hope she keeps that opinion to herself - 'cuz there are surely employers who will do what they can to make their employees sick with the thought that they will increase productivity.

[tyrone_sweatt]

This is one of the jacked up two-way streets of life at work. If employers didn't decide to be cheap and start this PTO cost-saving crap, employees would stay home sick. And if people didn't falsely abuse the sick leave policies when it existed, employers would have never established PTO, but this falls on the managers, because if they did their jobs and reprimanded the abusers of Sick Leave and not let the issue of abuse exacerbate, PTO would have never been a need. Now everyone suffers. I used to work in an office that established PTO, and the entire floor had a flu virus that circulated for over a YEAR, because no one wanted to use their vacation time to stay home to recuperate.

[SandFox999]

One time in class the person who sat next to me came in sick. The next day, my birth day, the same virus infected me. People who come in sick often have no regard for other people. Same goes for those who don't wash their hands after using the bathroom. While you don't have to be OCD, you also don't have to be a dirt bag either. Tripe Tripe Tripe Triffle

[MegaProcrastination]

I'm not saying people who have a sniffle should stay home sick and I understand there are many people who abused sick leave but dog-gone, this whole thing of going to work sick is a bunch of nonsense. Back in my day we had two weeks' sick leave plus two weeks' vacation. We stayed home when we were sick and took care of ourselves properly. Every year there would be a flu virus that would knock me out of work for an entire week, so sick I could barely get out of bed.

I absolutely hate it when I go to town and get checked out of a store by a sick cashier or some such. They're touching my FOOD as they ring it through and I have to touch it after I get home. For over a decade I had a chronic illness that affected my immune system. When I got a flu virus I wasn't just out for a week, I was out for a month to six weeks. Two viruses a year were all I needed to end up spending months almost on my back.

How many older people end up dying because they contracted a flu virus from someone working while they were sick? I personally know at least one. He had health problems and wasn't long for this world anyway, but he ran into a flu virus that killed him in sight of a week. I don't suppose that really matters to people who work when they're sick but it most likely would matter if that person was one of their loved ones.

People don't end up passing the "same" virus round and round and getting sick off the same thing all over again. By keeping on with what we "need" to do instead of staying home and getting over something we're infecting so many people with our bugs that they're likely mutating to the point where our immune systems are no longer recognizing them so it appears we have the same thing all over again.

I don't know about the rest of you but I am sick and tired of being sick and tired all the time from people working when they're sick.

[NT014]

I once asked a cashier to use the hand sanitizer before ringing me out.

[TLUnrine]

As a small call center manager for several years, I had many operators come in sick. Even though the 'fear' is that one sick person could wipe out the entire call center; it never happened.

The company I was with used PTO also, and people do have a tendency to come in sick, versus staying home, getting charged a day's vacation/sick day, and losing that vacation day for later.

Now if a person came in 'walking dead;' that might be different story. Yes there are contagious colds out there; but clearly sending every little sniffle home wouldn't be the solution.

[ladyang]

We had a temp in our office that was forced to go home when he was sick. He didn't have medical insurance and don't get paid when he's not working. So I don't think anyone should be forced to go home unless they are contagious

[mld1979]

As mentioned in the article, "contagious" is a very poor determinant for whether or not to work sick.

[esnation]

A whole bunch of us don't get sick days. We also don't get paid if we take a day off. We also get docked pay if we leave early or come in late. The workplace is basically biased for the employer. Workers rights? Like you see on the Equal Opportunity posters they like to slap around the walls of a shop, are smoke and mirrors. OASHA is a joke. So why should I take a day off when I feel like crap? I like to spread the pain around. If my boss catches it and dies...well that's gods will ain't it.

[mld1979]

Nice attitude. Yes, that's sarcasm. It's not just the boss that could catch it.