The company I have recently started working for has had several non work-related injuries/illnesses lately.   Some of the employees have been off for a while and may soon be able to work light duty.  Every other company I have worked for has offered light duty - at the company's descretion, and if it's available - to employees whether their injury was work related or not.  My new company is very heavy manufacturing, and there is not much "light" duty to go around.  They are considering not offering light duty at all for non work-related injuries.

 Does anyone out there have a policy that specifically addresses light duty for non-work related injuries/illnesses?

Here is what I have done in the past.  I have found that the quicker you get someone back to work, the quicker they are to get better (whether it is work related or not).  I have done my best to accomodate light duty where I was able to.  It never failed that I would have a route driver that had injuried themselves, in the office doing paperwork on light duty and they hated it!!  It was amazing how quickly they got the return to work authorization from their doctor.  They wanted to be out on the road and not in the office doing paperwork. I always made sure that I stayed within the restrictions the doctor had given.  If the ee tried to do something outside of these restrictions I would tell them they were not allowed to and if they wanted to do those things that they would need to get the restrictions lifted from the doctor.  You want to be sure that you don't have someone just go to the doctor to get off restrictions too early and then injury themselves again, but I found the quicker they were back to work (in some capacity) the quicker they got better. Some people get used to being off of work (on STD or LTD) and milk the system so they don't have to come back anytime soon!

 

We have a policy that addresses 'Modified Duty'. We avoided the term light duty simply for the implication of the word 'light'. Since most health care descriptions involved something other than the employees regular duty then that is modified not light. A small difference arguably, but significant to its application. At any rate I do have a policy. Can you post your email?