My wife works in medical and the number of patients coming in has subsided due to COVID-19… She was asked if she could take annual leave one day this week due to a quiet day and she said yes. In preparation for the next time they ask, I have been doing some research and it's a little bit unclear weather companies can force employees to take annual leave (is a pandemic a natural disaster?). It's been a one off so far but I figure we need to get ahead of the game to be in a better position. If she refuses to take consistent annual leave, an option available to her employer is to make her redundant… but that could be more costly for them depending how long this BS stretches out…
So…
Grin and bare it? Take the annual leave until there is none left?
Be upfront and say I can take 1 annual per fortnight MAX
So no, if you don't want me here you're still paying me (risk redundancy)
-sources-
https://www.fairwork.gov.au/about-us/news-and-media-releases…
Where an employer directs a full-time or part-time employee not to work due to workplace health and safety risks but the employee is ready, willing and able to work, the employee is generally entitled to be paid while the direction applies. Employers should consider whether their obligations are impacted by any applicable enterprise agreement, award, employees’ employment contracts or workplace policies.
Under the Fair Work Act, an employee can only be stood down without pay if they cannot be usefully employed because of equipment break down, industrial action or a stoppage of work for which the employer cannot be held responsible. The most common scenarios are severe and inclement weather or natural disasters.
Standing down employees without pay is not generally available due to a deterioration of business conditions or because an employee has the coronavirus. Enterprise agreements and employment contracts can have different or extra rules about when an employer can stand down an employee without pay. Employers are not required to make payments to employees for the period of a stand down, but may choose to pay their employees.
What if I need to let employees go or reduce their working hours?
Some employers may need to make employees’ positions redundant in response to a business downturn. If an employee’s job is made redundant their employer may have to give them redundancy pay. The Fair Work Act has requirements that employers have to meet before they can terminate an employee’s employment, such as providing notice.
If an employer seeks to vary employees’ work rosters, they should review any applicable enterprise agreement, award, employment contracts or workplace policies. Particularly for full-time and part-time employees, an employer is usually required to seek employees’ agreement to change their rosters.
https://www.fairwork.gov.au/leave/annual-leave/directing-an-…
An employer can only direct an employee to take annual leave in some situations. For example, when:
the business is closed during the Christmas and New Year period
an employee has accumulated excess annual leave.
https://www.training.com.au/ed/scott-morrison-supports-force…
According to employment lawyer Giri Sivaraman in his interview with the Daily Mail, leave entitlement is subject to whether the worker is actually sick or requires testing for the virus.
If a worker has been told to remain at home and isolate themselves as a result of fears of exposure, they must be paid as usual, Sivaraman says.
This even extends to precautionary measures – being told to isolate as a result of the outbreak for a period of time to be ‘on the safer side’, this technically counts as a suspension from work and means that the worker should continue to get paid normally, without the need for any leave.
WA - https://www.commerce.wa.gov.au/labour-relations/employment-i…
Standing down staff where a business has been impacted
Where a business has been impacted by travel or import / export restrictions resulting from the novel coronavirus, and there is no work or reduced work available to employees, employers must continue to pay full time and part time employees who are willing and able to work unless the employees are covered by a WA award which contains specific stand down or break down provisions which would cover this scenario.
Full time and part time award free employees would need to continue to be paid by the employer as there is no stand down provisions in the Minimum Conditions of Employment Act.
An employer and employee can agree that the employee takes a period of accrued annual leave or long service leave during a period when business is impacted. Information on annual leave and long service leave is available on the Wageline website.
Its tough time, everyone going to cop it one way or another.
Then you should go for paid leave. At least you get to work on some days. There are some casuals who wouldn't be able to work at all. So consider yourself lucky.