Is Your Fit-for-Duty Policy Actually Fit for Duty?

A policy, by its very nature, serves as a guiding framework within an organization. It provides a tool to educate workers on the expectations and standards that they will be held to, while at the same time outlining what they can expect in return from their organization. When written in a comprehensive and easy-to-understand manner, policies provide consistency and clarity, helping to ensure that all workers are treated fairly and equitably. Additionally, policies provide legal protection and recourse for both parties if obligations are not upheld.

“Fitness for Duty” policies aim to ensure that employees possess the physical, physiological, and psychological capabilities necessary to carry out their job responsibilities safely and effectively. Being Fit for Duty is especially of concern when it comes to workers operating in safety-sensitive positions - such as positions involving machinery, vehicles, or chemicals - where worker limitations and impairment could result in an incident or near miss with the potential for high consequences. Industries such as manufacturing, construction, transportation, oil and gas, and mining are among the key industries where worker Fitness for Duty directly influences operational safety and productivity.

Recognizing the importance of Fitness for Duty and crafting and implementing an effective Fitness for Duty policy is essential for businesses that want to ensure safety, worker health and wellbeing, productivity, competitiveness, and financial prosperity. It is important that these policies are not only compliant with legislation and industry standards, but are also very clearly written, thorough, and include basic processes to ensure consistency in the application of the policy, and are pragmatic and practical for the specific organization.

Let’s take a look at a few of the vital components of an effective "Fitness for Duty" policy and explore how you can use these to craft a policy that not only prioritizes the health and safety of your employees but is also compliant, thorough, and legally defensible.

1. Legislative and Industry-Standard Compliance

An initial goal of the Fitness for Duty policy should be to meet or exceed legislative and industry-standard requirements. This means establishing processes within your policy for ensuring adherence to Human Rights, Privacy, and OHS legislation, along with any industry-specific legislation (such as Canadian Aviation Regulations). Some examples of how legislative responsibilities should be reflected within your policy include:

• Human Rights (Accommodation) - Your policy should contain a reference to or a statement regarding your company’s recognition of its duty to accommodate persons with disabilities to the point of undue hardship. Additionally, it should be noted within the policy (and be a required part of your process relating to assessing accommodation) that the organization will utilize the opinion of medical and addiction specialists to identify and understand the worker’s accommodation needs and to assess the organization’s ability to meet those needs. Having this clause within your policy not only reflects a commitment to follow Human Rights legislation, but also aligns with Contractor Management database requirements, like ISNetworld, and the Canadian Model for Providing a Safe Workplace Alcohol and Drug Guidelines and Work Rule.

• Privacy (Confidentiality and Records) – All information that touches a Fitness for Duty system, including test results, medical clearance forms, documentation forms, and Substance Abuse Assessment reports, should be collected, used, and disclosed in accordance with provincial and federal privacy legislation. The policy should include basic processes and obligations regarding who in the organization will receive confidential information, where and how these records will be stored, and who will have access to these records. When including this information in the policy, we recommend using titles or functions, rather than specific individual’s names. For example, “confidential information will only be received by Designated Employer Representatives (DERs) and the Human Resources Manager”.

• Occupational Health and Safety / OHS (Roles & Responsibilities) – In alignment with OHS legislation, the responsibilities of the key worksite parties – that is your workers, supervisors, and ownership, should be outlined clearly within your policy.

2. Focus on “Fitness for Duty”

Another important aspect of your policy is the overall focus of it. Rather than focusing solely on substance use, your policy should be focused on the broader and more comprehensive concept of worker Fitness for Duty. This includes acknowledging that Fitness for Duty challenges come from many sources (including fatigue, mental health, physical impairments, medical conditions, medications, and drugs/alcohol) and building in expectations and processes relating to these challenges.

A great way to assess the focus of your policy is to look at the title. If your policy is currently titled “Drug and Alcohol Policy” or “Substance Abuse Policy”, you are likely not addressing Fitness for Duty as wholly as you could be.

3. Glossary and Definitions

As one of the primary objectives of the policy is to make clear the expectations of all parties within an organization, it is important that everyone is working with the same lexicon.  Your policy should define all unclear or vague terms, acronyms, and industry-specific terms. No parts of the policy should be open to interpretation, thus mitigating the risk of misunderstandings and even legal complications.

Some important definitions include:

• BAC (Breath Alcohol Concentration)
• Cannabis Product
• Company Business
• Company Premises and/or Worksite
• Drug
• Employee
• Fitness for Duty / Fit for Duty
• Impairment
• Medication
• Safety Sensitive Tasks / Positions
• SAE / SAP (Substance Abuse Expert / Professional)
• Supervisor

4. Mechanisms and Processes for Disclosures & Investigations

Building in worker obligations relating to, and processes for, disclosing Fitness for Duty concerns, is key to mitigating safety risks and possible incidents before they happen. This includes advising workers that if there is any condition that could make it challenging to work safely (including new medications, mental health challenges, fatigue, medical conditions, injuries, and substance use concerns), they are obligated to disclose this to their direct supervisor. Additionally, processes related to investigating Fitness for Duty concerns, such as obtaining medical clearance or investigating a reasonable cause situation, should be included and generally outlined within the policy.

5. Testing Situations

What are all the possible testing situations under the policy? This informs employees when they can and should be expecting to get tested. This may include pre-employment, random testing (however, we do not recommend this), pre-access / site-specific, post-incident, reasonable cause, return to duty, or follow-up. Information on testing situations should also include eligibility, test criteria (post-incident), and the general procedures of the testing process.

6. Associated Costs

If no costs are outlined with the policy and no notice has been given, it can be hard to require a worker to pay for testing or policy-related costs. There are certain situations in which it may make sense and be reasonable to ask a worker to assume financial responsibility, but what are those situations? We recommend including payment responsibilities for situations such as:

• Testing costs (relating to specific test reasons)

• Substance abuse and mental health assessment costs
• Counselling or treatment costs (if needed)
• Medical clearance costs

The above components represent some important information that should be included in your policy. At the end of the day, a well-structured and comprehensive Fitness for Duty policy is about an organization's commitment to its most valuable resource—its people and their safety. It serves as the foundation for an effective Fitness for Duty system, but to move beyond mere compliance and really support and create a safe and healthy work environment, it must be supported by the establishment of clear procedures and standards, consistent training for all levels of the organization, a testing regime, and communication structures.

Looking to find out more about Fitness for Duty policies, Fitness for Duty systems, or what you can do to shift to a safer workplace? 🔗 Visit our website or give us a call!

In the mean time let's visit your Policy right now. See our Fitness for Duty Policy Scorecard, it’s yours, no strings attached.

👇 Download it now and see how your policy stacks up: Shift OHS - Fit For Duty Score Card 👇