Fit notes failing due to poor handwriting – what’s new for employers?
A report in the Daily Telegraph on 15th June says that employers at the recent CBI absence conference complained that the system was failing because a) GPs have no idea about an employee’s work environment and b) their handwriting is illegible.
It has long been the case that the old Med3 was often illegible – I should know, I was an HR manager trying decipher them! Hence one of the Fit Note reforms was to have them printed out A4 size and electronically.
One also wonders if certain GPs who are worried about the recriminations if they say too much are making the form difficult to interpret. They should not need to know about the employee’s job as all they are supposed to comment on on the form is the impact of the condition on what the employee can and cannot do, for example unable to reach to a high shelf or needs to sit down regularly. Let’s hope these controversial but well intentioned reforms don’t fail simply due to form filling.
