Continuation of pay and sick pay allowance

Information for scientists and other employees at the UKE

A serious illness or an accident can lead to a longer period of incapacity for work. This raises important financial questions for those affected, e.g. regarding continued payment of remuneration and sick pay allowance

 Under collective bargaining agreements, employees at the UKE continue to receive pay for six weeks (=42 calendar days) in the event of incapacity for work through no fault of their own. It should be noted that periods of incapacity for work due to the same disease (subsequent diseases) which are separated in time are counted together. If the total period of six weeks is exceeded, the continued payment of remuneration ends and the employees are entitled to sick pay.

Employees on parental leave whose employment relationship is suspended are not entitled to continued payment of remuneration. After the end of parental leave, the entitlement shall be revived, whereby the previous incapacity for work during parental leave shall not be counted towards the six-week period. The amount of continued remuneration is calculated on the basis of the remuneration of the three preceding calendar months.

After the continued payment of remuneration has expired, employees with a period of employment of more than one year are entitled to the payment of a sick pay allowance by UKE until the end of the 13th week at the latest, and with a period of employment of more than three years until the end of the 39th week of incapacity for work at the latest. It should be noted that all periods of continued payment of wages and sick pay allowance within the respective calendar year are counted together to determine the end of the period (13th or 39th week).

The amount of the sick pay supplement corresponds to the difference between the gross sick pay paid by the health insurance fund and the average net pay of the three preceding calendar months for those insured by law. There are some special regulations in this regard, including for those not insured by law. After the expiration of the sick pay allowance, persons insured by law continue to be entitled to payment of sick pay by their health insurance fund.

Although sick pay is generally unlimited in time, it is paid for the same illness for a maximum of 78 weeks. This duration is reduced by days on which the entitlement was suspended (e.g. due to continued payment of wages). After the sickness benefit payments have expired, a reduced earning capacity pension may follow if the incapacity for work continues, or initially unemployment benefits in the event of incapacity for work.

Medical faculty funds research projects delayed by COVID 19 pandemic

As was the case last year, the Dean’s Office is providing funding to keep externally funded graduate students and temporary postdoctoral fellows employed for a reasonable period of time. Requirements for application are that the employment would otherwise expire, the project was delayed by the COVID 19 pandemic, the third-party funder does not provide for an adjustment in funding period due to the COVID 19 pandemic, and there is no other opportunity for follow-on funding. Applications may be submitted to the Office of the Associate Dean for Research (Dr. Klempahn, k.klempahn@uke.de) by the project leader and will be available on a rolling basis until April 6, 2021 for the time being.

Automatic blocking of E-mail addresses after termination of employment contract

Preparations are currently underway at UKE for the introduction of a central identity and access management system. These preparations have already led to an important change: Employees‘ user IDs and e-mail addresses will be deactivated immediately after termination of their employment contract. The deactivation takes place automatically on the termination date. An important exception to this rule is that in the case of a seamlessly subsequent contract, the identifiers remain in place. In the event of subsequent re-entry into the UKE, the old identifiers and e-mail addresses cannot be used again. For persons without an employment contract (e.g. alumni, students, doctoral candidates, visiting scientists, scholarship holders), however, user IDs and e-mail addresses with the marking „ext“ (for „external“) can be created (e.g. a.schmidt.ext @ uke.de). The application can be made with the usual form of the GB IT (with marking as „external“). However, such a user ID cannot be used to access data from a previous employee identifier.