Sick Leave Calculator South Africa

What this calculator does — and the argument it ends

This tool answers the two questions that actually come up when somebody phones in sick for the fifth time this quarter: how many paid sick days do they still have, and may I lawfully refuse to pay this one. Both have precise statutory answers, and both are routinely got wrong in the same two directions — employers who think sick leave resets every January, and employers who think a missing doctor's note is an automatic deduction.

Neither is true. Sick leave in South Africa runs on a three-year cycle, not a calendar year, and BCEA Section 23 is far narrower than most disciplinary codes assume. Getting either wrong produces an unlawful deduction — which is exactly the kind of small, provable, indefensible claim that turns into a CCMA referral over a few hundred rand.

The entitlement: six weeks per 36 months, not 30 days per year

Section 22(2) does not name a number. It defines the entitlement by reference to the employee's own work pattern:

That is where the familiar 30 comes from: a five-day week × six weeks = 30 working days. But the same section gives 36 days to a six-day-week employee and 24 to somebody contracted for four days — which is why this calculator asks for the pattern instead of printing 30 on every screen. A part-time employee on three days a week is entitled to 18 paid sick days per cycle, and paying them 30 is as much an error as paying them 10.

Two features of the cycle catch employers out. First, it is 36 months, not 12 — it runs from the date employment began and then repeats, so an employee two years in has whatever is left of one allocation, not two fresh ones. Second, the full allocation is available immediately at the start of the cycle. Sick leave does not accrue monthly the way annual leave does. An employee seven months into their second cycle can lawfully take all 30 days, and refusing on the basis that they “haven't earned them yet” has no statutory support.

The first six months: the rule almost nobody applies correctly

Section 22(3) replaces the six-week entitlement during an employee's first six months with a much smaller earning rate:

Roughly one day per calendar month worked. A new hire who is off sick for a week in month two has taken about five days more than they were entitled to — and those extra days are unpaid unless the employer chooses otherwise, or the employee agrees to take them as annual leave.

The part that gets missed is Section 22(4). Once the employee passes six months and the full entitlement opens up, the employer mayreduce that first cycle's allocation by the days already taken under 22(3). Those early days were an advance against the 30, not a separate allowance on top of it. Many payroll systems reset the counter at six months and hand the employee a clean 30 — a generosity that is legal, but should be a decision rather than a default.

A worked example you can check by hand

An administrator on a five-day week, 14 months into service, has taken eight sick days since they started:

Those 22 days remain available until month 36, at which point whatever is unused disappears and a new 30 begins. There is no pro-rating and no carry-over — the reset is a cliff, not a transfer.

When you may actually withhold pay: Section 23, precisely

This is the single most misapplied provision in the BCEA. Section 23 permits an employer to refuse payment for a sick absence only where the employee fails to produce a medical certificate on request, and one of two conditions is met:

• The absence ran more than two consecutive days. Three days or longer. Two days is inside the protected zone, not outside it.
• It is the third or later occasion in an eight-week period. Two short absences in eight weeks are protected; the third is not.

Everything else must be paid. A policy that reads “a medical certificate is required for all absences” is not unlawful as a reporting rule — you may ask, and you may discipline an employee who ignores a reasonable reporting procedure. What you may not do is dock the pay for a single-day absence because no note arrived. That is an unlawful deduction under Section 34, and it is trivially provable from the payslip.

The certificate itself must be issued by a practitioner registered with a statutory council — a doctor, and in defined circumstances a registered nurse, traditional health practitioner or other qualifying professional. It must state that the employee was unable to work for the period, on account of sickness or injury. A note that merely records that the employee said they were unwell does not meet the standard, and a note bought over a counter is a misconduct matter in its own right — but one you must prove, not assume.

What sick leave is not

• It is not paid out at termination. Unused sick days have no cash value on resignation, dismissal or retrenchment. Only accrued annual leave is paid out, under Section 21. Employees frequently expect otherwise; say so early.
• It is not an injury-on-duty allowance. Section 24 excludes any absence compensated under COIDA or the ODMWA. Those days go to the Compensation Fund and must not be deducted from the 30 — booking them as sick leave quietly robs the employee of statutory days they will need later.
• It is not maternity leave.The four months under Section 25 are separate, and the parental-leave regime shifted again after the Constitutional Court's Van Wyk judgment in October 2025.
• It is not family responsibility leave.The three days under Section 27 cover a child's illness or a death in the immediate family — a separate, annually-resetting entitlement that does not touch the sick leave balance.

When the sick leave runs out

Once the entitlement is exhausted, further absence is simply unpaid. The employee may agree to take annual leave instead, and most do — but it must be an agreement. Unilaterally converting the absence to annual leave, or deducting the day from the salary without written consent, breaches Section 34 in the same way as the certificate mistake above.

If the absence pattern reflects genuine long-term ill health, the matter has stopped being a leave question and become an incapacity one, governed by the 2025 Code of Good Practice: Dismissal, which replaced Schedule 8 of the LRA on 4 September 2025. The Code expects an employer to investigate the extent of the incapacity, consider adapting the duties or finding suitable alternative work, and consult the employee — before dismissal is even on the table. Dismissing somebody for exhausting a statutory entitlement, with none of that behind it, is close to an automatic loss at the CCMA.

Where the absences look dishonest rather than medical, the route is misconduct, not incapacity: a proper investigation, a notice of hearing, evidence, and a decision that survives review. The two routes have different procedures and are not interchangeable — picking the wrong one is itself a procedural defect.

The record is the whole defence

Every one of these rules turns on a date and a count: when the cycle started, how many days have gone, how many consecutive days this absence ran, how many occasions fell inside the last eight weeks. Reconstructed from memory and a WhatsApp thread, those numbers are indefensible. An employer who cannot show the count cannot justify the deduction, and in a dispute the burden of showing the absence was unpaid lawfully sits with the employer, not the employee.

Our free leave tracker template keeps the sick leave cycle, the days taken and the eight-week occasion count in one sheet, and the leave application form captures the certificate at the point of the absence rather than three months later.

SOUTH AFRICAN SICK LEAVE — THE STATUTORY METHOD (BCEA s22 read with s23)

THE ENTITLEMENT (s22(2))
Paid sick leave per 36-MONTH cycle = the number of days the employee would
normally work in SIX WEEKS.
  5-day week -> 30 paid days per 36 months
  6-day week -> 36 paid days per 36 months
  4-day week -> 24 paid days per 36 months
It is NOT an annual entitlement. The full allocation is available from the start
of the cycle; it does not accrue monthly.

THE FIRST SIX MONTHS (s22(3) and s22(4))
During the first 6 months of employment: 1 paid day per 26 DAYS WORKED.
s22(4) allows the employer to reduce the first full cycle's entitlement by the
days taken under s22(3) — so those days are advanced, not extra.

THE RESET
The cycle runs 36 months from commencement, then repeats. Unused days are LOST
at the reset — sick leave never carries over into a new cycle and is never paid
out in cash on termination.

WHEN PAY MAY LAWFULLY BE WITHHELD (s23)
Only where the employee fails to produce a medical certificate on request AND
either:
  (a) the absence was MORE THAN two consecutive days, or
  (b) it is the THIRD or later occasion in an eight-week period.
A single day without a note must still be paid. The certificate must be issued
by a practitioner registered with a statutory council.

EXCLUSIONS (s24)
Absence compensated under COIDA or the ODMWA is NOT sick leave — it is claimed
from the Compensation Fund and must not reduce the 30-day entitlement.

WORKED EXAMPLE
5-day week, 14 months' service, 8 sick days already taken this cycle:
  Entitlement: 5 x 6                  = 30 paid days
  Taken:                              =  8 days
  Remaining paid balance:             = 22 days
  Cycle month 15 of 36 — resets in 21 months, unused days then lost.

Source: Synthro — Sick Leave Calculator (South Africa)
https://www.synthro.io/tools/sick-leave-calculator-south-africa
Rules last reviewed August 2026 against the BCEA and the 2025 Code of Good
Practice: Dismissal (effective 4 September 2025).