This has probably been posted somewhere but I couldn’t find it.
If you are confirmed positive and a doctor recommends you stay home, can a public or private high school insist you use paid holidays for taking the 3 days or so the doctor recommends you take off, off?
Are we supposed to tell the school we are planning to come to work, so they then insist we stay home? In that case is it paid leave without using paid holidays? Or would they just let the teacher come and teach while positive? Or can they put you on unpaid leave ( forcing you to use paid leave).
How are you guys coping with COVID without losing paid holidays or pay?
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I suppose you could take unpaid leave, if you insisted. Not sure why you would want to. There is no “sick pay” in Japan. That’s what your paid holidays are for. You’re not going to find a “loophole” to get free paid days off.
Is it not written in your contract?
In my case, in April, we were informed that we no longer get sick leave, including for documented things like diagnosed influenza/ COVID. In the past, we did get paid sick leave for influenza with proper documentation from a doctor, but to put us more in line with other ‘part-time’ city employees since the city no longer employs JETs, it was removed.
So basically… if we get COVID, we have to suck it up and use nenkyu or unpaid leave (and get pay adjusted accordingly, which is probably ill-advised for being taihen for the accounting staff).
I doubt any school in their right mind would let a teacher come in and teach if positive, and they’d probably be pretty pissed if they found out you were trying to hide it.
In terms of ‘coping’… well, I’m still wearing a mask if not in the front of the class, washing hands, using hand sanitiser, and trying to avoid catching it in the first place.
It’s common in Japan to use paid time off for both vacation and sickness. When I worked as a teacher, the only time we could get paid without using paid time off was if we were hospitalized.
In my company, when I had covid last year I had to use their insurance, as an “industrial accident” (労災). I had to stay home for 10 days, 6 of those were weekdays. I got paid six months later, a percentage of my actual pay (I believe it was 70-80%), based on those 6 days + the cost of my consultation with the hospital (about 5k). However I have no idea if they would still offer this nowadays (since the government changed the covid classification).
Can someone chime in about the shakai hoken? Isn’t there something about getting like 60% of your pay after being away from work for more than 3 consecutive days (as in being sick)? I believe there is something like this, but I haven’t used it personally. If I recall correctly you get nothing during the 3 first days, then 60% of your pay (they’ll calculate how much is your day and give you 60% of that).
As others have said, sick leave ain’t a thing for most people, unless your contract says otherwise. Hell, I even had to use a paid leave last month because of the typhoon. School closed down and we all had to use it. So if you can’t use one of those two options above, I guess it’s either use the yukyu or get unpaid leave.
My contract has separate sick and personal leave. Check your contract.
I have 5 days off and if you still feel bad after that you have to take nenkyu.
That’s the ridiculous thing, it’s not “paid holidays” in Japan, it’s “rest days” for things like being sick.
Before COVID was downgraded, special leave was granted for COVID. Now it’s treated as any other disease. Generally, if you’re sick, your paid leave days are used to cover the days you’re absent from work. You could take unpaid leave, but there’s such a negative stigma attached to it that you’d sooner be forgiven by your workplace for kicking puppies than taking unpaid leave.
Some work contracts provide paid sick leave that require a written doctors note to use. Check your contract for that.
I got covid while on vacation already, but I was told if I wanted to take any extra days off I’d have to use vacation days. It’s really unfortunate that I’d already used vacation days, as I seriously would’ve shown up with a 103 degree fever and been like sorry guys, they said I can’t use the sick leave that’s literally in my contract 🤷♂️
Check your contract and if you have sick leave, insist about it.
This kind of things happened to me 20 years ago and while it was a big organization, the staff had no idea sick leave existed. So ask and insist, if you have it in your contract.
It’s like that for me too. When I got sick with covid last year and the school didn’t let me come for 10 days, they told me to use my paid days off. Since that was my first year working there, I only had 11 days of paid holiday. I used it all for covid and didn’t even have a choice to come once I got better. I had to stay home for 10 days. Since then I realized that if I ever got covid again I wouldn’t tell my school. I just can’t stomach Japanese work style , which is why I won’t renew my contract.
Nah. I’ll go to work if I’m physically able. Company wants me to stay home, company can pay me to do so.
If you are positive with COVID and are unable to work because of this, your company is obligated to pay you for 60% of your daily rate unless you choose to take paid leave. This is due to it being your company who is technically not allowing you to work due to an infectious disease. The same goes for influenza. It’s usually up to 5 days.
This will depend on contract type though so doble check your company’s Rules of Employment.