Spain Expat Press explains: Employees in Spain may be entitled to five days of paid leave when someone close to them suffers a serious illness, accident or requires hospital treatment – and the right extends further than many people realise.
Spain Expat Press Editorial Team
What happens if your partner is suddenly admitted to hospital, a parent becomes seriously ill or someone needs looking after at home following an operation? Can you take time off work without losing your salary?
In Spain, under certain circumstances, the answer is yes.
Spain’s Workers’ Statute (Estatuto de los Trabajadores) provides for five days of paid leave in specific situations involving someone close to the employee. What may surprise many workers is that the entitlement is not restricted to children, parents or spouses.
When are you entitled to the five days?
The leave can apply in cases of serious illness, a serious accident, hospitalisation or surgery that does not require an overnight hospital stay but does require recovery at home.
The last situation is particularly important. A patient may undergo a procedure and be discharged on the same day, but the employee may still qualify for the leave if a doctor confirms that home recovery is necessary.
Who is covered?
The entitlement covers a spouse or registered partner as well as relatives up to the second degree by blood or marriage.
This can include children, parents, parents-in-law, siblings, grandparents, grandchildren, brothers- and sisters-in-law, sons-in-law and daughters-in-law.
There is another important provision: the person requiring care does not necessarily have to be a relative.
Someone who lives in the same household as the employee and requires care may also be covered. In such cases, the employee may need to provide evidence of the shared address, for example through Spain’s municipal register, the empadronamiento.
What documents will your employer require?
Employees must be able to provide evidence of the circumstances giving rise to the leave.
For a hospital admission, this will normally mean providing the relevant certificate from the hospital or medical centre.
Following outpatient surgery, it is particularly important that the medical documentation states that recovery or rest at home is required. Simply proving that someone attended hospital or underwent a medical procedure may not always be sufficient.
The employer may also require evidence of the employee’s relationship with the person receiving care. Where there is no family relationship, proof that both people live at the same address may be necessary.
Do you have to disclose the diagnosis?
Employees are not generally required to provide their employer with unnecessary details about another person’s medical condition.
What matters is demonstrating that the circumstances meet the legal requirements for the leave. A full medical history or unnecessary details about the precise diagnosis do not need to be disclosed simply to justify the absence.
Five days – on full pay
Provided the legal requirements are met and the circumstances are properly documented, this is paid leave.
For people working in Spain, it is an important employment right that many may still be unaware of. If someone close to you suffers a serious illness or accident, is admitted to hospital or needs care following an operation, you may be entitled to five paid days away from work.
And perhaps the most surprising aspect is that the person you are caring for does not always have to be a member of your immediate family.
