Four hours a week was all his certificates allowed - and it proved decisive
An employee who refused to share further medical details lost his unfair dismissal case - and any shot at compensation.
In a decision handed down on July 10, 2026, the Fair Work Commission dismissed a claim brought by a hospital coordinator against Monash Health, one of Victoria's largest public health services. The reason was blunt: he couldn't perform his role, and he wouldn't give his employer the information it needed to work out whether that might change.
The worker joined in January 2025 as an International Medical Graduate (IMG) Affairs Coordinator - a full-time job coordinating registration and visa matters for overseas-trained doctors. Within weeks, managers flagged lateness, unexplained absences and unfinished work. He disclosed that he had ADHD, and the employer put a support plan in place with flexible start times, hybrid work and mentoring.
By mid-May 2025, he had stopped coming in and did not return. He raised a complaint accusing a colleague of "bullying" and alleging an uneven workload; the employer investigated and found the material did not support the bullying claim, and identified no workload imbalance. A later workers' compensation claim was rejected.
From July 2025, his medical certificates were consistent: two hours a day, two days a week, in a "non-stressful role." That is four hours a week - roughly 10% of a full-time load. The employer said the coordinator role, built on time-sensitive registration work and constant stakeholder contact, could not run within those limits.
This is the part HR leaders should linger on. The employer asked, again and again, for more from his treating doctor - what "non-stressful" work meant, and how long the restrictions would last. He declined, citing medical privacy, and pointed back to the certificates already supplied. The Commission noted he was offered the chance to provide further information "on at least 10 occasions" and knocked each one back. As the Commission put it, "It is difficult to envisage a situation where an employee could have been less co-operative."
The worker argued the employer had cut corners - relying on time-limited certificates, skipping an independent medical exam, and terminating before completing a return-to-work or reasonable-adjustment assessment. The Commission was not persuaded. His certificates were identical for months, he had been absent more than six months, and his own evidence was that his condition persisted up to the hearing. An independent exam was optional, and hard to justify when the employer could not get basic clarification from his own doctor in the first place.
The Commission found there was a valid reason for the dismissal related to capacity, that the worker was told of it before the decision, and that he had a genuine opportunity to respond. The dismissal, it held, was not harsh, unjust or unreasonable.
The employer also won on remedy, in the alternative. Even had the dismissal been unfair, the Commission said it would order neither reinstatement - which the worker did not seek - nor compensation. On the standard Sprigg approach, it found he would likely have worked only four hours a week for the balance of his fixed-term contract, about $1,883, while the four weeks' pay in lieu of notice he had already received, $6,996.13, cancelled that out. Compensation came to zero.
The takeaway for HR is a practical one. Reasonable adjustments and medical clarification cut both ways: an employee who won't engage cannot later complain the assessment was incomplete. Put requests in writing, give clear notice and a real chance to respond, follow your long-term illness procedure, and act on the medical evidence you have. The Commission was plainly satisfied with an employer that did just that.
