Paid sick leave benefits are not required by law. Unpaid sick leave, however, may be legally required if you are subject to either federal or state family and medical leave laws. Sick leave, like other time-off benefits, is valuable to employees and, when combined with certain disability insurance benefits, can create an attractive package of benefits that make employees feel secure and valued.

 

A federal survey of small employers (businesses with fewer than 100 employees) revealed that 50 percent of them offered some form of paid sick leave benefit.

As with vacation leave, the amount of paid sick leave you offer is entirely up to you. Most businesses that offer a sick leave plan establish a set limit on the amount of time for which an employee can be compensated. The number of days can:

• depend on the circumstances, at your discretion (though such discretion should be fairly applied to avoid charges of unfair discrimination)
• be a fixed, predetermined amount, such as ten days each calendar year
• be based upon the length of service of the employee

If you decide to offer paid sick leave, you might want to have a written policy to explain the procedures and limits of the policy. Some points to include in your policy are:

• how the sick leave program coordinates with your short-term disability policy, if you have one
• what constitutes a sickness
• whether the policy extends to a child's or spouse's illness
• whom an employee should contact in the case of sickness
• whether employees can accrue and carry over unused sick days from one year to the next

 

A sample sick leave policy is in the Business Tools area.