Recently I was working with one of Recruitment School's clients and they were complaining about employees buying medical certificates online.

Now I had heard of this, but dismissed it as I thought there is no way that can be legal, so away I went to see if I could buy a medical certificate online that is legitimate.

1. First off to the website and no I am not going to mention the website here.
2. Register which was pretty easy, usual email password etc
3. Click on "get a doctors certificate"
4. It asked me from when to when. I enter today and chose the maximum which was 7 days.
5. Its asks for my name, date of birth and my ailment. So I enter the data required and entered "I am really stressed and need some time off"
6. It then asks for my Credit Card which I give them and click submit. They charged me $49.95 as I wanted it within 4 hours but for $9.90 you can have it in 48 hrs.
7. I then receive a notification saying

Your Partner Doctor has been going through your consultation (authors note: what consultation, I haven't spoken to a soul), and has sent you a message. This will help them make an informed decision about your health needs.

"Hi Steven, so sorry you are experiencing such stress. I hear that you are not coping well. It is important to speak to your GP about this imminently and see if any coping strategies can be offered in the form of a mental health care plan. I will issue a medical certificate. Please take this time to destress"

And within minutes I receive this message

Hey Steven Begg!

Hard to believe some people still get a medical certificate in person, right?

Thankfully, your medical certificate is ready to download.

It’s been reviewed, accepted, and signed by your Partner Doctor.

And here it is: Dr Certificate Jan SB.

Now I have hidden the name of the company, the Dr and my DOB as you don't need to know that, but the rest is exactly the way it came out.

So I started digging around. Yes the Dr is registered as a GP in Australia. I then submitted a request with the FW Ombudsman to see if they could help shed some light on this practice and they came back with a generic "we are unable to help you at this time"

So my question is this, given it is now possible to buy your own Dr Certificate for $10, as employers, how do we control this? This is absolutely ridiculous.

By the way, the issuing company said that they have a system where a person who uses their platform more than twice gets blocked within certain days - well thats BS as I know of an employee who has used it four times in one month and still has the gall to submit Dr Certificates from the same place. What's worse, other people in that company are now presenting Certificates from the same place!!!!

So, be aware everyone. I suggest you amend you leave policies to say you only accept Dr Certificates from Dr's who perform face to face or at least Telehealth consultations.