Sick cert online: what employers in Ireland accept

What an employer is actually asking for

An employer asking for a sick cert wants one thing on paper: independent confirmation that a doctor assessed you and judged you unfit for work over a defined period. That is the whole job of the note. It is not a diagnosis, and in Ireland an employer has no entitlement to be told your diagnosis, which is why a properly written cert names dates and fitness for work and stops there.

HR and payroll need the note because an absence has to be classified. Certified sick leave is treated differently from unexplained absence, it interacts with statutory sick pay and with any company sick pay scheme, and it has to be evidenced if the file is ever reviewed. Everything beyond that basic confirmation belongs to a different process. Fitness to return, restricted duties, phased return and workplace adjustments are occupational health questions, and no sick cert answers them.

So the practical test for a note is narrow. Does it identify you, does it identify the doctor well enough to be checked, does it state the dates, and was it written by someone who assessed you. A note that passes those four tests is doing what an employer needs.

From which day a cert is usually required

The most common arrangement in Ireland is that self-certification covers the first two days of absence and a doctor's note is required from the third day. That is a widespread convention rather than a single national rule, and the binding version for your own job is in your contract of employment or the staff handbook, so read that before you read anything else.

Variations are ordinary. Some employers ask for a note from day one, particularly where the role is safety critical or where the absence follows a pattern. Some accept self-certification for longer. Some ask only where the absence crosses a pay period or a rostered shift that has to be backfilled. Public sector schemes and collective agreements often set their own certification rules and may name who is entitled to certify.

Statutory sick pay adds a second layer. The Sick Leave Act 2022 created a statutory entitlement to paid sick leave in Ireland, and the number of paid statutory days is set by regulation and has been changed since the Act commenced, so take the current figure from Citizens Information rather than from any health page including this one. What matters here is that statutory sick pay is certified: the employer is entitled to a medical certificate covering the days claimed. That is a good reason to arrange the note at the start of the absence rather than at the end of the week.

What has to be on the note

A cert that gets accepted without argument carries the patient's name and date of birth, the dates of unfitness, the date the note itself was written, and enough detail about the doctor for the employer to verify it: full name, professional qualification, registration or licence number, work address and a contact route. A signature completes it.

The detail that gets forgotten is the doctor identification block. A note with a scrawled signature and no printed name, no registration number and no address invites a query from HR, and the query lands on the employee rather than on the doctor. If you are given a note that is missing any of those, ask for it to be reissued before you send it in.

Diagnosis is optional and usually absent. Some doctors write a broad phrase such as a viral illness or a musculoskeletal problem. Neither is required and neither should be pressed for. If your employer insists on a diagnosis, that request is worth checking against your own data protection rights and your contract before you comply with it.

The distinction that matters: sick cert versus Certificate of Incapacity for Work

These are two different documents with two different purposes, and mixing them up is the single most common mistake on this topic in Ireland.

A sick cert goes to your employer. It is handed or emailed to you, you pass it to HR, and it evidences your absence under your contract and under statutory sick pay.

A Certificate of Incapacity for Work is the document that supports a claim for Illness Benefit from the Department of Social Protection. It is completed by a doctor on the Irish Medical Council register who has examined you in person, and it is submitted through the state channel rather than handed over as a private note. A private sick cert does not substitute for it, no matter how well written it is, and a certificate from a doctor registered in another EU member state does not substitute for it either.

The consequence is simple. If a state payment is part of your plan for this absence, you need an appointment with an Irish GP and you need to ask specifically for that certificate. If what you need is a note for your employer, that is a separate and simpler piece of paperwork.

How a certificate from a doctor registered in another EU state is treated

For the employer's purposes, what gives a certificate its weight is that a qualified doctor carried out an assessment and put their name and registration details to the conclusion. A doctor registered in another EU member state is a qualified doctor, and a note from one carries the same evidential character as a note from an Irish GP when it contains the same details.

That said, acceptance is a workplace question rather than a legal one. Some contracts and collective agreements name who may certify absence, in which case that clause governs. Some large employers route any absence past a few days to occupational health regardless of who wrote the original note. A note in a language other than English can slow things down. And a note that lacks the doctor identification block described above will be queried whichever country it came from.

The honest advice is to check the handbook first. Where it is silent, a complete and verifiable note from an EU-registered doctor is normally accepted. Where it names an Irish GP or an occupational health provider, follow that instead of arguing the principle.

Where certs get refused, and why

Refusals cluster around a small number of causes, and almost all of them are avoidable.

The first is backdating. The date on a certificate is the date the assessment happened. A doctor can describe an illness that began earlier where the history supports it, which is not the same thing as pretending the assessment happened earlier. Certificates that appear to have been written after the fact attract scrutiny.

The second is a missing or unverifiable doctor. If HR cannot confirm that the person who signed it is a registered doctor, the note fails at the first hurdle.

The third is scope. A note stating fitness for restricted duties, or recommending equipment or a phased return, is doing occupational health work and will be routed there.

The fourth is a pattern. Repeated short absences certified in the same way tend to trigger an attendance review, which is a management process rather than a medical one, and no certificate resolves it on its own.

The fifth is simply lateness. Most sick leave policies set a deadline for submitting a cert. If illness genuinely stopped you from arranging one, say so in writing at the time rather than explaining it weeks later.

What MEDINOW does and does not issue

MEDINOW does not issue sick certificates for employers, and there is nothing on this page to buy. We say that at the start of the section rather than at the end, because a page that ranks for sick certs and then quietly steers you towards something else wastes your time.

What we do run is an asynchronous written service. You complete a medical questionnaire, lek. Damian Wojno reads it in his own time and either issues a prescription document or declines and explains why. There is no video consultation, no telephone appointment and no live chat at any point, which is the main difference between this model and the online GP services advertised in Ireland.

The two assessments we currently offer are a repeat prescription review at 19.90 euro, for treatment you are already established on, and a weight management assessment at 29.90 euro. In both cases the fee covers the medical assessment itself and not the issuing of a document. If the doctor declines on medical grounds, the fee is refunded. If you do not send the documentation the doctor asks for, the assessment counts as carried out and the fee is not refunded.

If what you need today is a note for your employer, an Irish GP or an Irish certification service is the right route, and this page exists so that you can walk into that conversation knowing what to ask for.

What to do today if you are out sick

Tell your employer on the first day, by whatever route your policy names, and say how long you expect to be out. That call or message is often more important to HR than the certificate that follows.

Open the staff handbook and find the certification clause. It will tell you from which day a note is needed, who may issue it, where to send it and by when.

Arrange the assessment early rather than late, because a cert dated the day you actually saw a doctor is cleaner than one arranged at the end of the week.

If the absence is likely to run long enough to matter financially, check the Illness Benefit position at the same time, because that requires the separate state certificate described above and it cannot be sorted out retrospectively with a private note.

Keep a copy of everything you send. Attendance disputes are usually settled on dates and documents rather than on recollection.

Who wrote this page

This page was written by the MEDINOW editorial team and reviewed by lek. Damian Wojno, a doctor registered in Poland, PWZ no. 3211301. He is not on the Irish Medical Council register and does not hold an Irish practice address, which is exactly why this page is explicit about the Irish routes that sit outside our service. Reviewed on 29 August 2026.

This is general information about how absence certification works in Ireland. It is not legal advice and it is not a substitute for your own contract of employment, which is the document that governs your case.

The employment and social welfare points here were checked against Citizens Information and the Workplace Relations Commission rather than written from memory, and any figure we could not confirm at source was left out instead of estimated. Corrections are welcome by email and are made to the page rather than argued about.