Background
- Our Transitional Duty program started in 1990. It is offered for a limited time to partially disabled employees. Transitional Duty is defined as work that is different from the requirements of an employee's usual duties or represents a modification of his or her regular duties.
- The transitional duty payroll is offered to employees who would otherwise be off work on temporary disability.
Program Specifics
The standards for being placed on the Transitional Duty payroll are as follows:
- An employee must be Temporarily Totally Disabled and not be permanently disabled or permanently precluded from returning to work.
- The injured employee must be released to return to restricted duty by his/her treating physician.
- The employee must have been disabled from performing any work for at least one day.
- The Workers' Compensation Department authorizes and monitors the Transitional Duty payroll.
- The Workers' Compensation department is responsible for the cost of the Transitional Duty Payroll.
- The treating physician is provided with a detailed description of the employee's job duties. The physician is then able to determine which job functions that can or cannot be performed by the employee.
- When an employee is incapable of performing his or her usual and customary job on a temporary basis, we maintain ongoing contact with the treating physician's office, the employee and employee's supervisor.
- We have found that the ongoing contact actions are helpful in reducing the length of time an employee may be on total temporary disability. The transitional duty program helps to return more employees to work. If an employee does not lose any time from work, and is immediately released to restricted duty, their wages are paid by the department providing the transitional duty work and not by the Workers' Compensation department.
- Direct your questions to your Worker's Compensation claims representative or the Worker's Compensation Helpline at 415-973-8700 and select the option 2.