The federal government wants to abolish the "yellow glow" in paper format for sick leave from employees - and replace it with a digital certificate. This is a bill proposed by Minister of Economics Peter Altmaier (CDU) for less bureaucracy, which should be decided on Wednesday by the Cabinet.
Anyone who has previously been sick from the doctor gets a certificate on yellow paper - hence the name "yellow glow". The sick report consists of several certificates. One must be sent to the employer, one to the health insurance, one is for personal files. The Techniker Krankenkasse already has a pilot project for a digital sick leave.
In the future, this will apply to all persons insured under the law. Then the respective health insurance company will inform the employer electronically about the beginning and duration of the incapacity of his legally insured employee.
The economy does not go far enough
Health Minister Jens Spahn (CDU) had already brought a new regulation on the way, according to which the incapacity certificates from 2021 by the treating physicians to the health insurance funds only to be transmitted digitally.
This regulation is now to be supplemented by the fact that the certificate is also transmitted digitally to the employer. The regulations are due to enter into force on 1 January 2021.
In 2017, around 77 million certificates were issued - this information from the Central Association of Statutory Health Insurance (SHI) is quoted in the draft of the Ministry of Economic Affairs.
The coalition plans next to the digital illness notification further measures for less bureaucracy. So it is to give in the future with electronically stored tax documents facilities. For hotel accommodation a digital registration form is provided.
Top-level associations of the economy do not go far enough. "A swallow does not make a summer and a digital yellow bill still no bureaucracy relief law," said the chief executive of the employers' association BDA, Steffen Kampeter, the dpa. "How noticeable bureaucratic relief of companies really is, is evident in the overall view."