What are occupational sick pay (OSP) schemes?

Cintra iQ provides a facility to manage a range of Occupational Sick Pay (OSP) schemes. OSP entitlements are calculated by length of continuous service and paid as a factor of full pay. An employee can only be attached to one scheme at any specific date, but you can create any number of schemes with different rules.

 

Use this article to learn more about the OSP Scheme functionality. Go to Cintra iQ: Payroll Setup> Benefit Schemes> Occupational Sick Pay

 

You can open an existing definition or create a new one to view the Occupational Sickness Scheme window.

 

About Occupational Sickness Schemes

Within the Occupational Sickness Scheme window, you can perform the following:

• Enter the Occupational Sickness Scheme's details.
• Enter the Occupational Sickness Scheme's entitlement.
• Define Occupational Sickness Scheme pay.
• View the Occupational Sickness Scheme Membership.

Scheme Details tab

Within the Scheme Details tab you can perform the following:

 

Name	Description
Enter the Scheme Details.
Select Pro Rata Settings.
Enter Waiting Days.
Scheme Details	On the Scheme Details tab, if you intend to take on any history for sickness records, you must ensure that the date the scheme started is before your oldest record. The scheme will not be effective until this date starts. If the Offset SSP box is selected, then Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) would be offset when all other offset rules pertaining to OSP have been fulfilled.  Generally this box should be unticked, so that when an employee has run out of OSP, SSP will no longer be offset.
Pro-Rata Settings	The Pro Rata settings can be either based on working days or what is set as default on the payroll.  This would be used to pro-rate pay.
Waiting Days	Waiting days can be applied before OSP is paid.  You can also apply waiting days to the first, second, or third record etc and any subsequent periods of sickness within a rolling year.

Entitlement tab

Within the Entitlement tab, you can define the following:

• Entitlement Settings.
• Entitlement Details.

 

Entitlement Settings

Name	Description
Entitlement Type	You can select whether the scheme is Absolute or Ragged. Absolute: means exactly one calendar year i.e. entitlement is for a rolling 365 or 366 day period.  Ragged: means a rolling year may extend beyond 365/366 days if any part of a sickness record fell one calendar year ago i.e. if an employee was sick one calendar year ago, entitlement will be adjusted by all sickness days in that sickness period. If the Entitlement Type is Ragged and the scheme is based on a Rolling Year you would look back exactly one year from the first day of the current spell of sickness to see how many days sickness the employee has had.  If the employee has been off sick over the date one year previous you would include days sick from the start of that spell of sickness.  If the scheme type is Absolute you would look back exactly one year and disregard any days prior to this date. Absolute Entitlement Type takes into account sickness from 23/12/17 to 22/12/18. Ragged Entitlement Type takes into account sickness from 15/12/17 to 22/12/18.
Service Length Units	You can select whether the service length of the scheme is in Months or Weeks.
Entitlement Length Units	You can select whether the entitlement length of the scheme is in Months, Weeks or Days. Note: For a weekly payroll, the entitlement can only be Weeks or Days.  Fixed If the entitlement length is a Fixed Year, then you need to define the day and the month that the fixed year commences.  Rolling If the entitlement length is a Rolling Year, then you need to define whether it is absolute or ragged and the limit of calendar days in rolling years. eg. It may be that you have a rolling year but there may be a limit of the number of days taken over a series of years.
Reduce remaining entitlement at highest possible rate	If this option is checked and if the previous sickness is at half pay, then this will be counted against entitlement to full pay first. If this option is not checked, then the entitlement will be reduced for the full pay factor actually paid.

Entitlement Details

Within this pane, you can enter the number of periods of entitlement in each service length, by highlighting the record and entering the value.

 

  Note:

The following details depict the duration of how long the employee has been employed and what they are entitled: 0 - 3 months = no entitlement to OSP. 4 - 6 months = 1 month full pay only. 7-12 months = 2 months full pay + 2 months 1/2 pay etc.

 

Buttons

Name	Description
Full Pay Factors	You can set the value to which the sick pay applies. You can set Full Pay factors. e.g. 1.0 and 0.5. You can also define whether SSP still needs to be offset, as some organisations will not offset SSP when an employee reduces below a factor of 1.0. For more information, see How Do I Create Full Pay Factors for Occupational Sickness Pay?
Service Length Limits	You can set the length of service the sick pay affects. For more information, see How Do I Create Occupational Sickness Pay Service Length Limits?
Protected Periods	You can set the periods in which the employee's entitlement should not be reduced. eg. If a teacher is sick over the summer holidays, this is not counted against their entitlement. For more information, see How Do I Create Protected Periods for Occupational Sickness Schemes?

Full Pay Tab

Within the Full Pay tab, you can define what payments make up the full pay for an Occupational Sick Pay Scheme (OSP). All payments are excluded until you select the desired payments to include in the OSP.

 

Pane	Description
Include Payments pane	This pane contains the desired payment types that you wish to include as Full Pay for the OSP.
Excluded Payments pane	This pane contains all the excluded payments of the OSP.

Scheme Membership Tab

Within the Scheme Membership tab, you can see who is a member of the scheme. This view is read only.