ACC claims
The employer reimbursement agreement
The employer reimbursement agreement is held by the Ministry of Education and ACC and allows an employee to receive continuous pay while on ACC leave and ACC reimburses weekly compensation to your school. The decision for an employee to be covered under the agreement relies on whether they have enough sick leave balance to cover the 20% salary that ACC does not reimburse.
If your employee has enough sick leave balance, they are entitled to continually be paid 100% of their assessed salary. ACC will reimburse 80% and the remaining 20% will be deducted from their sick leave balance.
If an employee does not have enough sick leave balance, they might be entitled to be paid 80% of their assessed salary directly from ACC, if ACC have confirmed they will be covering the claim.
Employees who are recognised by ACC as having multiple employers/other income, will be paid directly by ACC. For these employees, you need to submit a NOVO12acc leave booking form advising ACC leave without pay as soon as possible to ensure that your employee is not overpaid.
Timesheet/day relief staff are not covered under the employee reimbursement agreement and are paid directly by ACC. Please only pay them for hours physically worked.
Employees on timesheet/relief need to submit a timesheet for the FIRST WEEK OF ABSENCE, advising hours and dates to be paid as sick leave or if a work-related accident, pay as salary.
Beginning of an ACC claim for an employee
Employee's responsibility
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1. Visit your doctor.
2. Ask your doctor to send the medical certificate to ACC. The certificate needs to say why you can't work and for how long. If it's for a new injury, your doctor will send the certificate in when they lodge your claim. If it's for an injury ACC already cover, they can send this on its own.
3. Contact ACC on 0800 101 996 and request "weekly compensation" and advise of any other support you require. Once ACC receives your medical certificate, they can start sorting out your weekly compensation.
ACC require you to contact them and request weekly compensation. This is not automatically processed and needs to be requested directly by the employee due to privacy as ACC will not discuss claims with EPL.
4. Advise your school about your situation as soon as you're injured. Your school will need to book Sick leave (SL), or Sick leave without pay (SLWOP) if you have insufficient sick leave, until Education Payroll receives confirmation directly from ACC.
5. ACC will contact you directly advising you whether they have accepted your application or not. If your claim is due to a work-related injury, your school will also receive a letter confirming the work-related injury.
a. If your claim has been declined or waiting for approval, you need to advise your school as your leave will need to be booked as SL or SLWOP if you have insufficient sick leave.
b. If your claim has been accepted, your leave will be amended to ACC leave.
6. Please advise your school if ACC is paying you directly as your leave will need to be booked as unpaid leave.
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School's responsibility
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1. Ensure your employee has contacted ACC and requested weekly compensation.
2. Enter SL or SLWOP in EdPay unless this was the first week of a work-related injury. If so, you will need to submit a NOVO12acc leave booking form advising ACWK1 for the date range (not exceeding 5 continuous days for a non-teacher and 7 continuous days for a teacher). The first week of injury is considered a stand down period to ACC; therefore, this cost is covered by the school.
3. If you receive an email from ACC requesting you confirm whether you would like to opt in/out of employer reimbursement agreement, please advise them to send that notification to 3p@novopay.govt.nz along with any forms labelled ACC38, ACC40 or ACC5791. You can also forward these emails or forms you receive from ACC to support@novopay.govt.nz as soon as possible. The ACC forms will be completed by Education Payroll.
4. Once you have received confirmation from Education Payroll that we have received the relevant documentation from ACC, submit the NOVO12acc leave booking forms advising ACC leave. Correct leave code(s) must be advised to prevent any delay in processing. See the ACC leave code decision tree
5. Advise Education Payroll when the employee returns to working their normal hours by sending an email to support@novopay.govt.nz with the subject heading: Employee's name, MoE Number, Return to working normal hours, Date returned
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How compensation is paid to your school
Once Education Payroll receives the reimbursement from ACC, we will forward the payment to your board's bank account and a reimbursement letter will be sent to your school's principal.
Please refer to the Ministry of Education website for the use of ACC reimbursement or contact the Ministry of Education's resourcing team for bank staffing queries.
Accident Compensation Corporation claims – Education in New Zealand
Payroll outcomes for staff who have had an accident
- Teaching staff work-related accident: the employee continues on full pay and no sick leave is deducted.
- Teaching staff non work-related accident: the first week of absence is deducted from their sick leave balance at full days. From the second week onwards, the employee continues on full pay with 0.2 sick leave for each day of absence debited from their sick leave entitlement until their sick leave balance is exhausted. Once their sick leave balance has been exhausted, ACC without pay (ACCWO) needs to be entered, and ACC will pay the employee directly.
- Non-teaching staff work-related accident: the employee continues on full pay for the first week with no sick leave deducted. From the second week onwards, the employee continues on full pay with 0.2 leave for each day of absence debited from their sick leave entitlement. Once their sick leave balance has been exhausted, ACC without pay (ACCWO) needs to be entered, and ACC will pay the employee directly.
- Non-teaching staff non work-related accident: the first week of absence is deducted from their sick leave balance at full days. From the second week onwards, the employee continues on full pay with 0.2 sick leave for each day of absence debited from their sick leave entitlement. Once their sick leave balance has been exhausted, ACC without pay (ACCWO) needs to be entered, and ACC will pay the employee directly.
- Staff that ACC have recognised as having multiple employers: ACC will be paying these employees directly. The first week of absence is covered by their sick leave. From the second week onwards, the employee will be paid 80% directly from ACC. If they have sick leave balance and wish to use this as a top up (20% sick leave top up), your school can advise this in the comments section when submitting the NOVO12acc leave booking form.
ACC leave code decision tree
Please note
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To book the following leave codes: ACNW2, ACW2N, ACWK2, the employee must contact ACC and request weekly compensation. This is not processed automatically and needs to be requested by the employee. Call ACC on 0800 101 996 to request weekly compensation
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ACC determines the date of injury based on medical certificates provided by the employee. ACC advises Education Payroll of the date of injury, so any leave associated with the injury prior to the date ACC advises, will need to be booked as Sick leave (SL) or Sick leave without pay (SLWOP) and is not included in the first week of injury.
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When calculating your employee's sick leave balance please remember, ACC reimburses up to 80% of the employee's salary. A maximum of 20% per day of sick leave is deducted after the first weeks stand down period eg your employee has 2 days sick leave balance after the first week stand down period. 2 days @ 20% will last 10 days as ACC leave
Image description
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This flow chart shows how to choose the right ACC leave code for a teacher who has had an injury and has a sick leave balance. For teachers with a work related injury in the first week of injury choose code ACWK1 (no sick leave deduction- funded by the school), in the second week of injury onwards choose code ACWK2. For teachers with a non work related injury in the first week of injury choose code SL (sick leave) full days sick leave deduction, in the second week of injury onwards choose code ACNW2 up to 20% SL deducted for each day absent as per work pattern provided by your school on the NOVO12acc form.
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Image description
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This flow chart shows how to choose the right ACC leave code for a teacher who has had a non work injury and has no sick leave balance. For teachers with a non work related injury in the first week of injury choose code SLWOP (sick leave without pay), in the second week of injury onwards choose code ACCWO (ACC unpaid leave).
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Image description
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This flow chart shows how to choose the right ACC leave code to use for a non-teaching employee who has had an injury and has a sick leave balance. For non-teaching employees with a work related injury in the first week of injury choose code ACWK1 (no sick leave deduction), in the second week of injury onwards choose code ACW2N 20% sick leave deducted for each day absent as per roster. For non-teaching employees with a non work related injury in the first week of injury choose code SL (sick leave), in the second week of injury onwards choose code ACNW2 20% sick leave deducted for each day absent as per roster.
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Image description
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Choose the right ACC leave code to use for a non-teaching employee who has had an injury and has no sick leave. For non-teaching employees with a work related injury in the first week of injury choose code ACWK1 paid ACC leave that is funded by your school, in the second week of injury onwards choose code ACCWO - unpaid leave. For non-teaching employees with a non work related injury in the first week of injury choose code SLWOP - unpaid leave, in the second week of injury onwards choose code ACCWO - unpaid leave.
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