Paid Sick Leave

In February the government passed Act No. 32/2019 of the Czech Labour Code.  Effective 1 July 2019 employees will be entitled to paid sick leave the first three days that they are ill.

Currently when you're sick, the first three days are unpaid.  After that, employees receive 60% of their salary paid by employers for 14 days.

In the past employees were paid the first three days.  In 2009 the three unpaid days were introduced to cut costs and prevent sickness benefits from being abused.  Since then the rate of employee sickness dropped significantly.

Many people feel that the three unpaid days financially penalises people for being sick.  Let's see what happens to sickness rates come July.

Something that I didn't know was that only 50% of sick pay is given if the reason for being sick is due to a brawl, due to intoxication, ingestion of psychotropic substances, or from committing a criminal offence.  This isn't new.  Just something that I didn't know about.

Update:  In July 2019, the first three days are now paid.