Sick Pay and the Qualifying Deduction

Sick leave is the most calculation-heavy item in payroll data, and the one that most often leads to questions from staff. This article explains exactly how Vendion calculates, so you can answer them.

This describes Vendion’s payroll calculation using a qualifying period under Gröna riksavtalet. The employer must check eligibility for sick pay and the applicable agreement. The statutory starting point is a deduction of 20 % of an average week’s sick pay. See the Swedish Sick Pay Act.

What happens when someone reports sick

A sick note is approved instantly and never enters an approval queue. Nobody asks permission to fall ill.

From that moment Vendion calculates three things automatically:

1. The absence deduction — the pay for the hours the person did not work
2. The qualifying deduction — the initial part of the absence that earns no sick pay
3. Sick pay — 80 % of what the person lost

All three appear as separate items in payroll data, and day by day if you click the row.

The qualifying deduction is hours, not a day

This is the most common misunderstanding, and it costs money if you get it wrong.

Vendion uses a qualifying period in hours equal to 20 % of the person's average weekly working time. Someone who normally works 40 hours a week therefore has an 8-hour qualifying period; someone working 20 hours has 4.

Three things follow from that:

• Weekly working time uses the twelve complete weeks before the payroll month’s starting week. Vendion averages weeks containing worked time when at least four such weeks exist. Otherwise it uses the employment percentage and configured normal weekly hours. Check both the history and employment details.
• The qualifying period starts at the beginning of the absence and is taken from the first available sick pay.
• A day that was worked does not count. If a whole day is registered as sick but the person clocked in and worked the shift, it is not a sick day, even when the day falls in the previous month. The qualifying deduction is then taken when the illness really starts.
• The deduction is capped at the sick pay calculated by Vendion.

The deduction is calculated as consumed qualifying hours times the hourly rate times 80 % — the same level as sick pay, since it is sick pay that is being reduced.

A long shift can absorb the whole qualifying period. A short shift means the qualifying period carries into the next sick day until the hours are used up.

Sick pay on days 1–14 — and what happens next

The employer pays sick pay at 80 % during the sick pay period, which is 14 calendar days starting on the first sick day the person would have worked.

Calendar days, not scheduled days. A part-timer working three days a week is therefore not on employer-paid sick leave deep into week five — the fourteen days run regardless of how many of them were working days.

When a schedule exists, Vendion uses each day’s scheduled net hours. Without a schedule it uses weekdays and an estimate based on the employment percentage. Check the result particularly when shifts are missing or the absence covers part of a day.

After the sick pay period. Vendion reports continuing days separately and does not calculate employer sick pay for them. It does not notify Försäkringskassan. The employer must report the absence and the employee must apply for sickness benefit. Follow Försäkringskassan’s instructions.

Employment shorter than one month: sick pay from day 15

If the employment is agreed for less than one month, the person is entitled to sick pay only after being employed for fourteen calendar days, that is from the fifteenth day of employment (Swedish Sick Pay Act, section 3). Vendion reads this from the start and end dates on the staff card: if the end date is less than one month after the start date, the rule applies. An employment from 1 to 30 November counts as one month.

• Sick days before day 15 give no sick pay and no qualifying deduction. The absence deduction is made as usual, since the person did not work.
• The qualifying deduction is taken on the first day with sick pay, also when the illness began in the previous month.
• Without an end date Vendion treats the person as entitled to sick pay from the first day.

The law counts an earlier employment with you if the break was at most fourteen days. Vendion does not know about it, so check the payroll data for someone re-employed after a short break. If you run payroll in Fortnox Lön or with a PAXML file, the absence is sent as sickness as usual, and the payroll system calculates sick pay using its own employment details.

The absence deduction for salaried staff

For someone on a monthly salary the deduction follows the same day numbering as sick pay:

A day the person actually worked is not deducted, and a partial day from day 15 is deducted at its share of the daily rate. The sick case runs across the month boundary: if someone falls ill on Monday 26 October, Monday 9 November is day 15, even though November has only just begun.

Sick again once the fourteen days are used up. If the person falls ill again within five days and the sick case's fourteen sick pay days are already used, the deduction is per calendar day from the first day of the new absence, also when it starts on a Saturday or another day off.

The rules come from Gröna riksavtalet § 19 mom 3.3–3.4 and apply in Vendion to all salaried staff.

Unsocial hours pay is included in sick pay

Someone who would have worked an evening or a weekend loses not only base pay but the unsocial hours supplement too. Sick pay therefore covers 80 % of the supplement that was lost on the days sick pay is paid.

The amount is already inside the sick pay — do not add them together. It is reported separately so you can see where the sick pay comes from.

One detail that matters in practice: since no sick pay at all is paid during the qualifying period, the lost supplement is read on the shift minus its first qualifying hours. The qualifying period eats the start of the shift. On an evening shift from 16:00 to 24:00 without a break and with two qualifying hours, the supplement from 20:00 remains — the cheapest hours fall away, not the most expensive.

The qualifying period is counted in working time, not clock time. If the shift has a break, it is spread evenly across the shift, since a break has a length but no clock time. The qualifying period then takes the shift's first working hours and ends slightly later on the clock than the number of qualifying hours. Example: on a 12:00–24:00 shift with a two-hour break, eight qualifying hours (a 40-hour week) take the shift up to 21:36, and the unsocial hours sick pay applies to the time after that.

Two shifts on the same day: the qualifying period takes the earliest shift first and continues into the next shift until the hours are used up.

Sick for part of the day: if the absence is registered with clock times, the qualifying period starts when the absence starts, and the unsocial hours sick pay applies only to the part of the shift the absence covers.

Relapse within five days

If someone falls ill again within five calendar days of a previous sick period ending, it counts as the same sick case.

The consequence is that there is no new qualifying deduction, and the fourteen-day count continues where it left off instead of restarting. Sick cases spanning a month boundary are held together the same way — the period is not broken just because the calendar is.

A whole worked day in the middle of a sick absence splits it. If the sick absence is registered as one long row but the person worked their whole shift on one or more days in the middle, Vendion splits the row at the worked days into separate sick periods. A whole worked day is a day when the punched time after breaks is at least as long as the day's scheduled shift. A day without a shift never counts as worked, and a shorter punch does not split the row.

• The worked days use up none of the fourteen sick pay days
• If the next period starts within five calendar days, the same sick case continues, with no new qualifying deduction
• If there are more than five days in between, a new sick case starts with a new qualifying deduction
• Days off without a shift between two worked days, for example the weekend between a worked Friday and Monday, do not count as sick days

The cap: ten qualifying occasions per twelve months

The Sick Pay Act limits the number of qualifying deductions to ten in a twelve-month period. Vendion counts occasions per sick case using recorded history and stops starting new deductions at the cap. Check any missing earlier occasions and decisions on special high-risk protection with your payroll administrator.

An occasion is only consumed if the qualifying period could actually be placed on sick pay that was paid. If there is no sick pay in that period, the occasion is not consumed.

Checking a single sick period

1. Go to Personal ▸ Löner (Staff ▸ Payroll) and select the month
2. Click the employee's row for the day-by-day view
3. Compare the items Sjukdagar, Sjuklön, Karensavdrag and Frånvaroavdrag
4. If the sick case is longer than fourteen days, check that the days after day 14 sit as Försäkringskassan days and that the absence deduction from day 15 is per calendar day

If an amount looks wrong, check the absence type, dates, partial day, schedule and employment details. Correct the absence and review payroll again. A locked month must be unlocked before recalculation; coordinate corrections to exported payroll with your payroll administrator.