How much sick pay NHS staff get
Agenda for Change sick pay builds up with your NHS service:
| NHS service | Full pay | Then half pay |
|---|---|---|
| In your first year | 1 month | 2 months |
| Year 2 | 2 months | 2 months |
| Year 3 | 4 months | 4 months |
| Years 4 and 5 | 5 months | 5 months |
| After 5 years | 6 months | 6 months |
Service with any NHS employer counts. If you left the NHS and came back, earlier service counts towards sick pay as long as each break was 12 months or less (for annual leave there's no limit).
The rolling 12 months
Your entitlement isn't a fresh allowance each year. On the first day of a new absence, your employer takes your full entitlement and deducts all the paid sick leave you've had in the 12 months before that day. Three kinds of absence aren't counted: unpaid sick leave, absence caused by an injury or illness that's wholly or mainly due to your NHS work, and certain injuries from crimes of violence connected with your job.
What "full pay" means depends on where you work
This is the part most calculators get wrong, and it matters most to shift workers:
- England: since July 2018, unsocial hours payments aren't part of sick pay for anyone who started after that date or whose basic pay is over £18,160, which is every band now. Full sick pay is your basic pay plus London weighting and any local pay protection. If shifts make up a big part of your pay, a long absence will cost you more than half pay suggests.
- Wales: the first week of an absence is paid on basic pay plus London weighting. From the second week of a continuous absence, sick pay includes regular supplements such as unsocial hours, based on the last three months. Absences from a work-related injury and terminal illness include them from the first day.
- Scotland and Northern Ireland: full pay includes regularly paid supplements, including unsocial hours, recruitment and retention premia and any high cost area supplement, based on what you'd have earned at work over the last three months.
Statutory Sick Pay is part of it, not extra
NHS sick pay already includes Statutory Sick Pay: your full pay is inclusive of it, and SSP plus half pay can't come to more than full pay. SSP itself is now £123.25 a week or 80% of your average weekly earnings if that's less, payable from the first day of sickness. It mostly matters once your NHS sick pay runs out.
When sick pay stops
Sick pay ends on your last day of employment, so it doesn't continue if your contract ends during an absence.