Temporary disability: information for companies

• The company may contact the Medical Inspectorate of the Public Health Service so that, if necessary, it can issue the corresponding sick leave report. In these cases, for economic purposes, this assumption will be treated as derived from an occupational accident and in accordance with the diagnoses that are identified by these processes related to COVID-19.

• More information in the Network Newsletter 3/2020 of 13 March 2020 ( link ).

• No, since the contingency is a common illness, regardless of whether its treatment for the purposes of the economic benefit is as a result of an accident at work.

• However, exceptionally, in those cases in which the illness has been contracted exclusively in the course of work, under the terms of the General Law on Social Security, it will be considered a work-related accident for all purposes and, in that case, it must be reported through the DELT@ system, as is usually the case.

• The full salary on the day of the sick leave will be paid by the employer, regardless of whether or not there has been any actual work done on the day of the medical sick leave.

• From the following day onwards, the entity that protects the professional contingency of the company's workers will be responsible for the temporary disability.

• The temporary  disability process will only be effective when the report has been issued  by the competent Public Health Service.

• However, the company must verify on a daily basis the existence of the sick leave, confirmation or discharge reports issued by the Public Health Services with respect to its workers in the INSS-EMPRESAS (FIE) Service, without having to wait for the worker to provide the copy of the aforementioned reports; information which will prevail over any other information received up to that point.

• Companies can access the FIE INSS- EMPRESAS Service on the Social Security website at the following link.

• The company’s actions aimed at suspending the employment relationship and recognising the right to economic benefits for temporary disability will not be initiated until the medical report is issued.
•  If the company has a sick leave report provided by the worker, it must act according to the sick leave date, recovery indicator and contingency that appears in the report.
• However, the company must verify on a daily basis the existence of the sick leave, confirmation or discharge reports issued by the Public Health Services with respect to its workers in the INSS-EMPRESAS (FIE) Service, without having to wait for the worker to provide the copy of the aforementioned reports. The information contained in the INSS-EMPRESAS (FIE) Service will prevail over any other information received up to that time.
• The company must pay the benefit to the worker from that moment, and from the date of initial leave, as a result of an accident at work.
• Companies can access the FIE INSS- EMPRESAS Service on the Social Security website at the following link.

• When the INSS receives a copy of the sick leave report issued by the Public Health Service for common contingencies, it will automatically include the occupational accident contingency in its computer applications and databases.  

• The essential information for the processing of these processes will be communicated to all the parties with competence in them (company, ISM, Mutual Collaborating Companies of Social Security and Social Security General Treasury).

• This automatic transformation will generate a notification for the company, through the FIE INSS-EMPRESAS file, which takes precedence over any other information.  

• Companies can access the FIE INSS- EMPRESAS Service on the Social Security website at the following link.

In accordance with data protection regulations, under no circumstances are companies or their representatives provided with information on the pathological nature or diagnosis of a temporary disability process affecting a working person, and therefore the FIE INSS-EMPRESAS will not include this information under any circumstances.