If the rules state you can’t take sick leave except when sick clearly it’s wrong to use it if you aren’t sick. There is obviously grey areas and individual situations. For me I just do what is right and never had any doubts what is right.
If you have to talk yourself into doing something due to ethical concerns, the answer is obvious.
Related questions, how many companies actually have a hand book? Mine doesn't.
I never really needed a manual to understand what sick day means or to understand the right or wrong way to use that benefit.
That's interesting because at my last company - we did need it. You see, we had "unlimited sick time" for years. If you were sick, you were expected to stay home. If you were out more than 3 days, they *could* request a doctor's note.
Now, our company HQ was on the East Coast, but California went ahead and passed a law saying that employers are required to allow employees to use sick time to care for sick children. Thus, my company had to change their manual to allow for that. Also, pregnancy throws another wrench in there with FMLA - so our company manual had to follow federal law too - this meant that if you were out sick due to morning sickness - you were supposed to take sick time AND count it as FMLA. Similarly, if you missed work due to doctor's appointments - sick time + FMLA.
Now add on having a baby - the company policy was for the first week before CA PDL (for CA employees) or Mat Leave (HQ employees), you took sick time + FMLA.
Complicated, right? It can be when you are dealing with multiple states. The only time the company REALLY looked into anything was when you were out sick more than 25-30 days in a year.
Eventually, the company went to PTO. That meant it didn't really matter, but they had to update the manual again.
The other complicated issue was with vacation - you see, HQ had a "use or lose" provision with vacation. Vacation was reasonably generous - you started at 2 weeks and earned an extra day each year, capping out at 6 weeks (I was at 19 days when I left). However, use or lose, and if you leave, you don't get paid out. Unfortunately for the company, CA state law REQUIRES you to pay out unused vacation when you leave and does not allow companies to take away what you've earned.
Thus, another policy change. Instead of use or lose, they started allowing HQ employees to carry over one week AND they put a cap on what you could accrue (for everyone, but mainly CA employees). So, once you accrued...4 weeks? 6 weeks? Depends on how long you've been there, you no longer accrue vacation time.
Our current company had "unlimited" sick time for awhile, before they moved to PTO. It made it a bit tricky for sick time and short term disability, both for child birth and for surgeries/ injuries. The switch to PTO came with new guidelines on when to use it (dr appts, sick, sick kids, or whatever you want!) However, even though they went over the switch in a company meeting (because the total # of days off stayed the same, but it was accrued differently), they never updated the manual. So, there isn't one. In fact, I think we had one year where they switched from unlimited to 5 days, and THEN switched over to PTO.
It really isn't all that simple when you are talking about different types of employees (exempt vs non), different states, short term disability, pregnancy, different ways of earning it, whether or not the company pays it out, whether or not it is use or lose.
Unlimited sick time = don't abuse it.