A Boots employee, living with long-term health conditions, started a petition on Organise platform nearly a year ago. They’d been hospitalised twice and still felt forced to go into work sick because they couldn’t afford time off.

They were left with no pay for three days, then just Statutory Sick Pay, which, at £118.75 a week, plunged them into stress and anxiety while they were meant to be recovering. They wrote:

“The system is unfair. I and my colleagues can't help having health issues.”

They demanded Boots pay sick pay in line with wages, to support recovery, protect public health, and stop workers being pressured back too soon, especially in stores where staff are in close contact with elderly and vulnerable customers.

What started with one worker’s voice quickly grew into a mass movement.

• Over 5,000 Boots workers and customers signed the petition
• More than 3,100 customers emailed the Boots CEO demanding change
• 66% of 15,000 customers said they would stop shopping at Boots until the company committed to fair sick pay.

But as Organise spoke to Boots workers across the UK, it became clear something wasn’t right. Staff were reporting wildly different experiences:

• Some said sick pay only kicked in after a year.
• Others said they’d been told company sick pay didn’t exist.
• Most had never seen the policy.
• Many were denied pay altogether, without any clear explanation.

The deeper we looked, the clearer it became: the sick pay policy was being hidden.

Staff were asking to see it and being told no. Managers gave contradictory answers and workers who should have been supported were instead being left unpaid and in the dark.

When Organise raised this with Boots, the company confirmed their sick pay scheme existed, but was discretionary. They said it was on the intranet but workers told us they couldn’t find it, couldn’t access the intranet, didn’t know it was there, or had never been shown it.

Despite repeated requests, Boots refused to share the policy directly with staff. So workers took matters into their own hands. One incredibly brave Boots worker who had access to a physical employee handbook scanned the sick pay policy and shared it with Organise.

That moment changed everything.

For the first time, the policy is out in the open. We shared it with workers across the country, and now, we’re sending it directly to Boots stores.

Boots workers deserve to know their rights and a policy that affects your income, your health, and your future should never be hidden behind a screen or left to manager discretion.

Here’s what we’ve done together so far:

• Exposed Boots’ hidden sick pay policy and equipped workers with the knowledge of what they’re entitled to.
• Funded the printing and posting of the policy to Boots stores in every major UK city
• Sent hundreds of emails to MPs calling for sick pay reform and manager training at Boots
• Backed a clear call to end the discretionary nature of the policy and ensure it is applied fairly to all staff

This is a major win for worker power. It didn’t come from the top. It didn’t come from the boardroom. It came from one worker speaking out, and thousands more backing them.

What’s next and how you can help

There are 52,000 Boots workers across 2,500 stores. Most still haven’t seen the policy, and many are still unsure what they’re entitled to.

We’re raising money to print and post the sick pay policy to every single store, so every Boots worker has the information they need.

Will you help get the policy into more staff rooms?

👉 Chip in to get the policy into Boots stores

👉 Share the policy with a Boots worker

If you’re a Boots worker who’s been affected, you can:

📖 Read the policy here

📝 Share your story anonymously

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Are you inspired by this story and want to start your own campaign? You can do so quickly and anonymously here: https://organise.network/organiser/petition/create

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