One of my employees has failed to turn up to work on a number of occasions due to the recent bad weather.
He lives much closer than some of the other employees who have made it in. Do I have to pay him as he is claiming that I have to as his non-attendance was caused by something outside his control?
The obligation is on an employee to turn up for work and therefore, where an employee fails to do so, there is no obligation to pay him. You may therefore deduct any hours that your employees failed to work. You might offer that employees can take this time as paid holiday in which case, they would not have to suffer a deduction from their usual pay.
If you consider that he could have come in to work but chose to stay at home without good reason, then you may consider investigating this to see whether there are any grounds to take disciplinary action against him. Also, if he just failed to turn up to work, and did not report in that he would not be attending, then this could justify disciplinary action.
Clearly, you must consider the health and safety of your employees and not expect them to risk their lives by attending work. However, where it is reasonable for employees to travel in to work, then they should do so.
If employees fail to come in to work because they have to look after their children due to unplanned school closures, then this should be treated as emergency time off for dependents. Employees are entitled to reasonable amounts of unpaid time off and no disciplinary action should be taken against employees who do this.
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