Fake sick notes are being sold online for as little as £25 as the number of people claiming to be too unwell to work surges to record levels.
The notes are almost identical to official documents used by GPs and are said to include functioning QR codes and links to government websites.
Notes sold on one website, Fast Med Notes, purport to entitle customers to up to seven months of statutory paid sick leave and benefits potentially worth thousands of pounds.
The site, which appears to have been registered in August 2023, offers to mark the notes with a recent date and advises that “some employers may require the sick note to be submitted in person, while others may accept it via email or fax”.
It says customers can “get a fake doctor’s note quickly and easily” with free home delivery within days, although it insists the notes are for “education/entertainment” and says it cannot be held responsible for misuse.
So-called statements for “fitness to work” are virtually identical to the “fit notes” used widely by the NHS and include spaces for buyers to write in details of medical conditions and workplace adjustments, such as alternative hours and reduced duties.
There are also spaces for the name of a doctor or healthcare professional to be filled out. Only licensed medical professionals are legally allowed to issue declarations about a patient’s fitness to work after conducting an assessment of their condition.
Doctors have warned that the notes are causing problems for GPs amid a record number of people being signed off from work.
Dr Udvitha Nandasoma, of the Medical Defence Union (MDU), which represents half of doctors, said the fake documents “serve only to add to the stress on GPs”.
“A GP will usually only become aware of a fake sick note if it is brought to their attention by an employer. If this happens, they can advise the employer [that] the note didn’t originate from their practice, but they should not share medical information about the patient,” he added.
Some 11 million absence notes were issued over the past year, an increase of one fifth compared with 2021.
Doctors and legal professionals have previously been warned about a rise in the number of fake sick notes in circulation.
In 2016 the MDU said there were various websites offering advice on how to forge a sick note or that allow a person to buy a replica NHS sick note. It has now said that it has become easier to forge doctors’ signatures with editing software available online.
DoctorsNoteStore, a site which previously offered fake sick notes, ceased operating in 2017 following the warnings. As well as selling the notes for £12, it offered extensive coaching on how to make them appear more official.
The seller’s website, which is still available online, provides “tips for a good sick note”. These include writing in the details of a local GP practice as opposed to a hospital because “it would be standard for your GP to issue the sick note”.
On choosing dates for an illness, the guidance goes on to say “don’t always go for the date of issue of the sick note as the first day you had off” because “it’s better to leave the date of signing the note until after the acute phase of the illness”, which could be a few weeks after the initial day off, it adds.
A notice on DoctorsNoteStore says that the documents are not for official use and are “novelty items”.
A notice on the Fast Med Notes website also states that “although our products look extremely authentic, they are for educational/entertainment use only. We are not responsible for misuse of our products.”
Fast Med Notes offers to email a copy of the sick note to customers within hours as well as providing free home delivery. The notes state that they can be used to claim statutory sick pay, currently worth just under £117 for as long as 28 weeks. Self-employed workers are said to be able to use the notes to claim out-of-work benefits worth a similar amount.
The NHS began using “fit notes” in 2010 but the documents are more commonly referred to as sick notes. They can be used to authorise statutory sick pay being given to a worker or form part of a claim for benefits such as Universal Credit.
The official documents are legally binding and can only be produced by GP practices, hospitals and other medical professionals. They are then sent to employers who have the responsibility of querying potential fakes. The notes are now mostly electronic, however can occasionally be written by hand.
DoctorsNoteStore said it was no longer operating, but did not comment further. Fast Med Notes was approached for comment.
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