employee sickness..

Who's sick though ?

I have a much smaller team but a team much like my self many of whom have small children.

We have 1 person most weeks at least 1 day who needs a childcare due to sickness day or an adult sickness day....

Out or 60 1 or 2 a week doesn't seem bad dependant on the demographic of your work force.

How does it compare to the previous stats before you started ?

In my experience with a team that has to run overnight at times no, if anything it might be low. SUrely HR professionals will have actual numbers

Working overnight is not ideal for good health i.m.e.

Dunno, i think you’d be surprised tbh.
I used to work with a guy who took the maximum amount of sick days, every year.
One extra day would have seen him disciplined, so he stayed within that.
I can’t imagine his case is massively unusual, although it would depend on the policy of the company concerned.

5% is what I remember as a normal sickness rate.

There is a system called the Bradford Score that lets you identify frequent short term absenteeism.

What does it equate to per person per year? I think we have an average of about 5-10 days per person per year depending on the specific area.

I think your own sickness record can influence your judgement. I'm never off sick so assume anyone who is is just taking the mickey.

You'd expect 5%, so 3 at anyone point. Ideally you'd be looking at underlying issues to find those genuinely sick, who may need support, or the one day CBA Monday lot. Depending upon your covid policy, we tell folk not to come in or WFH if OK if they are unwell - pre covid, folk would be in with the flu etc.

Two or three out of 60 shift workers is pretty good .

TBH averages etc don't apply when you get down to individual levels, not really. There's so many things that skew it- are people customer facing, doing physical work, old or young, in areas of high or low living standards... Used to work for a bank that just did not understand that the relatively old, relatively low paid, customer facing branch staff were far more likely to be ill than other areas of the bank, since they were both susceptible and exposed. THen I worked for a university that couldn't comprehend that the estates guys were off more because you can't really cut down a tree with a broken arm, while I could sit behind a desk. Stuff like that.

But most of all it's a big numbers vs small numbers thing, fairly few managers have enough direct reports for averages to apply down to a team level.

selkirkbear
Free Member

There is a system called the Bradford Score that lets you identify frequent short term absenteeism.

It does not. It's a useful tool for identifying some possible absenteeism, but it doesn't identify it as such. It's basically useful to help focus attention but any time you see it used as if it really identifies absenteeism, it's a pretty strong red flag for dysfunctional HR and management. A lot of places would be better off if they just didn't know it existed tbf.

Seems about right - you might want to drill down to who is off how often and why to see if someone has an ongoing issue - which may not be their illness. Could be covering for other problems, caring responsibilities, they may have a mental health condition they are hiding

not planning on doing anything

Sure about that or trying to impress your superiors  in new position?

a few chancers at my old work, we worked a 4 on 4 off.  one never worked a Monday as he didn't like Monday working some took every Saturday off (football) Then there were those who asked to get a day off when it was declined due to staffing shortages they were off sick anyway.

Most knew how to play the system and stayed below the HR % level. I knew what they were up to and they knew that I knew. HR had no real  interest as it was below the % trigger.

Depends how much of a name you want to make for yourself?

In the 4 months I’ve been working within the management team I don’t think we’ve had a week where we haven’t had at least one person off sick, many weeks have seen two or three off for a couple of days.

That sounds pretty normal to be honest. People get ill, some quite often (eg young kids or crap lifestyles).

nothing worse than someone off the shopfloor becoming management......... ;o)

Team of 95, varies but it’s about 5-10 a week and 2 long term, short term is currently mostly flu and covid has reared its head again. We don’t pay first 3 days, the usual anymore than a week need a fit note. 3 sickness spells in 26 weeks or over 3% can lead to a warning, first sits on record for 8 weeks, second 12 weeks, final 26 weeks, if you get a final and sick again within 26 weeks it’s dismissal.

We don’t pay first 3 days, the usual anymore than a week need a fit note. 3 sickness spells in 26 weeks or over 3% can lead to a warning, first sits on record for 8 weeks, second 12 weeks, final 26 weeks, if you get a final and sick again within 26 weeks it’s dismissal.

Sounds delightful. Where is that so I know to avoid?

Our sickness policy might be shit but thats just awful. I can only imagine what your employee satisfaction scoring looks like.

dismissing after 3 sick periods automatically is both harsh and could well lose at tribunal.

As others have said, 5% is pretty normal. You’ll probably get to know the names of certain individuals who are genuinely poorly and have underlying health issues and those pulling the wool. I’ve a team of 70 and know who’s who in this regard. And we’re generous, full pay for first three months and half for six. Local government though. And we’ve had someone off for 3 years recently, only just back in the last few months.

If we dismissed after 3 periods of sickness there’d be no one left, including my executive director.

ONS estimated 4.6 days per worker by taking # sick days / # workers, which is 2.2% so those claiming 5% as normal are probably over estimating. Of course depends on many factors as others have said above, that's a pure number average.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/labourproductivity/articles/sicknessabsenceinthelabourmarket/2021#:~:text=An%20estimated%20149.3%20million%20working,to%204.6%20days%20per%20worker.

If 4.6 is average however, and you have 60 staff, and your staff and job follow 'average' in the ONS understanding you'd have 60*4.6 = 276 sickness in an average year.

There's 52 weeks per year so in any given week you'd expect there to be about 5 and a bit sick days.

I don’t think we’ve had a week where we haven’t had at least one person off sick, many weeks have seen two or three off for a couple of days.

One person off, or a 2-3 for a couple of days - sounds quite close to around 5 per week on average.

Exessive sickness is generally due to staff being pissed off, and stopping caring or not feeling valued. IME.
I do know, that I will give 200% if I like the company and my colleagues.

Absence from covid and reduced immunity to other respiratory bugs over the last ~2.5 years is bound to cause an uptick.

dismissing after 3 sick periods automatically is both harsh and could well lose at tribunal.

I can't think of any situation where that would be acceptable purely for short term sickness.

Your absence rate sounds normal, you have to weed out the chancers and work with the long term sick. At best there are guidelines but you need to treat each case individually. The Bradford factor is a useful tool to manage managers. You set the triggers so that a manager must review sickness history at that point. The action could be a formal disciplinary or it could be formally noting that no actions needed as the employee has communicated well about their condition and it is being managed in partnership.

In my experience you need to get the chancers onto the formal absence management process asap, hopefully it will make them realise that their threshold for going sick is well below what is expected and they will change their behaviour. If not you can work through to the ultimate conclusion.

Long term sick is more complex, possibly has legal protections and needs handling carefully and sensitively.

Either way your primary goal is to get people healthy and back to work. If that can't be achieved things get more unpleasent. Got to remember staff off sick put additional pressure on colleagues and supervisors so it's not just the well being of the individual that has to be considered. At the end of the day the employee is contracted to provide labour, if their health is preventing them from doing that and reasonable adjustments dont work or can't be made the employee will be out of work as they are not capable of carrying out their contracted duties.

Sometimes a bit of tough love is needed, the number of people who I've had sat in front of me who say they can't help being ill when a lot is lifestyle, drinking too much, going to bed too late, poor diet etc. and the answer is lifestyle change.

At the end of the day you need to make sure you fully explore the issues, provide appropriate support and genuinely look at making reasonable adjustments before you let people go. Taking someone's livelihood away is not something to be done lightly but if an employee won't change their behaviour or their health prevents them from doing their job and there's little chance of that changing in an acceptable timescale they will need to have their contract terminated.

Again that needs to be done carefully, fail to tackle someone everyone knows plays the system will have a negative impact on other employees as will going in too hard and fast on someone with serious medical issues genuinely beyond their control.

Most of it is personal sickness rather than childcare.

it also sounds like it’s not massively high, as said above

I think your own sickness record can influence your judgement. I’m never off sick so assume anyone who is is just taking the mickey.

yep.. I’ve been very lucky and haven’t had much sickness at all. That does possibly colour my opinion.

I “think” we have a fair amount of chancers.. there’s a lot of individual sickness either before, or after leave and also over bank holidays.
However even though it’s known about, it’s within HR tolerance (seemingly) so there’s nothing to be done.

I felt we might have had excessive sick leave, it looks like we don’t.

There is a system called the Bradford Score that lets you identify frequent short term absenteeism.

don’t go there - it’s a horrible and divisive way of calculating absenteeism and I speak as an employer.

You do have to balance the chancers, there certainly are some who play the game, but again IME as a manager, they are the exeption rather than the rule.

A lot of general 'monday morning' or 'friday' sickness, points more toward a crappy working environment, or a staff member not feeling valued, usually due to office politics/cliques, etc.

I'll paraphase someone, cant't remember the name...

"no one goes to work on Monday morning thinking, I'm gonna do a really shit job today"

But they get ground down and think "sfuff it, why do I even care", by 11am.

Sometimes a bit of tough love is needed, the number of people who I’ve had sat in front of me who say they can’t help being ill when a lot is lifestyle, drinking too much, going to bed too late, poor diet etc. and the answer is lifestyle change.

That’s a dangerous game to play when any one of us on here it at higher than average chance of phoning in on a Monday with a broken collarbone.

mattyfez
Full Member

A lot of general ‘monday morning’ or ‘friday’ sickness, points more toward a crappy working environment, or a staff member not feeling valued, usually due to office politics/cliques, et

While yes, for sure, also people get thrown by the "common sense" of single day monday or friday absences being suss, compared to 2 day wednesday/thursday absences (or comparable, depending on whatever your work cycle is). But of course, you're just as likely to be ill sunday/monday as wed/thurs, it's just that the weekend illness is invisible to the employer.

There's a lot of traps like this. Of course people do pull sickies on monday and friday but tbf, cynical workplaces and badly written/applied policies will often lead to MORE absenteeism. Like, once you know that management treat a monday-only sickness as suspicious, why would you go back on tuesday?

@LMT bloody hell.

I had no sick days for 5 years then had 4 incidents in 6 months (hit by a car on my bike, in a car crash (passenger), atypical lung infection which led to a pulmonary embolism.

I'd be sacked because the RNG is an arse.

Last few places had a 3x in a year policy and interview to see what's up. In the above case they told me to take more time off and I thought I'd be grand and then the pulmonary embolism said hello.

That’s a dangerous game to play when any one of us on here it at higher than average chance of phoning in on a Monday with a broken collarbone.

That's not what I meant by lifestyle issues, a one off injury is not cause for any sort of absence management. A series of injuries over a year is absolutely valid to question lifestyle choices. Equally mountain biking does not mean repeat injuries, if you regularly ride extreme trails and crash, or even tame trails and crash a lot you need to accept your lifestyle choice is getting in the way of your ability to fund your lifestyle, something has to change.

I had no sick days for 5 years then had 4 incidents in 6 months

I was similar, HR didn't care. Or rather the witch* I spoke to didn't. Not interested in my reasons, Stage A sickness. Another absence within 6 months would be Stage B or else I'm out of Stage A. Of course sicknesses were taken over a rolling 12 month period so, sods law, I ended up back in a Stage A with 4 days to go. Then they witter on about stress and wellbeing and employee resilience without a shred of irony.

Thankfully she disappeared overnight (cleared her desk and didn't tell anyone) at one point and we got a human to replace her.

Either way your primary goal is to get people healthy and back to work. If that can’t be achieved things get more unpleasent. Got to remember staff off sick put additional pressure on colleagues and supervisors so it’s not just the well being of the individual that has to be considered. At the end of the day the employee is contracted to provide labour, if their health is preventing them from doing that and reasonable adjustments dont work or can’t be made the employee will be out of work as they are not capable of carrying out their contracted duties.

Sometimes a bit of tough love is needed, the number of people who I’ve had sat in front of me who say they can’t help being ill when a lot is lifestyle, drinking too much, going to bed too late, poor diet etc. and the answer is lifestyle change.

At the end of the day you need to make sure you fully explore the issues, provide appropriate support and genuinely look at making reasonable adjustments before you let people go. Taking someone’s livelihood away is not something to be done lightly but if an employee won’t change their behaviour or their health prevents them from doing their job and there’s little chance of that changing in an acceptable timescale they will need to have their contract terminated.

Again that needs to be done carefully, fail to tackle someone everyone knows plays the system will have a negative impact on other employees as will going in too hard and fast on someone with serious medical issues genuinely beyond their control.

To be honest though, that's not really anything to do with the OP. By that stage HR will have taken over and he's just a passenger to protect the company.

*she was hated by everyone on site, one of those people that the Peter Principle landed in the worst place possible.

stumpyjon sound like someone who has worked in the real world.

In 27 years as an engineering manager I only had 2 people who played the system. A solid system of absence management works well if you stick to it and document everything, all employees knew the procedure from the time they signed their contract. Of the 2 who milked it a bit 1 retired early as he realised he was not exactly very popular with his colleagues & had a wife that earned twice his salary.

The second burnt all his bridges with everyone and the final straw was his Novid + Depression & Anxiety disorder. Yes that's right Novid where you make it up that you have Covid. Suffice to say the other stuff was made up and he told 3 managers a totally different story.

To the OP how robust is your absence procedure and can it differentiate between people with a genuine problem and those that just play the game?

I have been all sides of this. employer, employee and union rep.

What Mr Overshoot says is right. Proper robust procedures applied consistently is the key. It does upset the genuine sick to be put thru a formal process but that process is needed to get rid of those who game the system which can be done pretty easily if you have proper proceedures

Sorry probably should word it better. So 3 spells in 26 weeks could lead to a first warning, have another sickness within 8 weeks of that warning it then moves up to the next warning stays on file for 12 weeks, then again another sickness in that 12 weeks leads to a final 26 weeks warning and then another sickness in that period can be dismissed.

It can take about a year to dismiss for sickness and tbh I’ve only seen 2 in 10 years, but that’s food retail all of them have this process and there’s no support to help, I work with my guys and support them, often get a telling off for not issuing a warning. But retails crap currently so can see why people are off, might be off myself at this rate soon.

To the OP how robust is your absence procedure and can it differentiate between people with a genuine problem and those that just play the game?

I'll admit I'm not sure how robust the procedure is. As I mentioned I'm fairly new to the role and we (there's 3 of us) are basically looking after the day to day running. My involvement with staff sickness is taking the call to say "I'm off" and then finding someone else/juggle rota around to fill the position.

Its a very large organisation I work for and issues like sickness management will get passed up. I'm going to find out if HR have ever reported back to us that an employee has a lot of sickness.

Thank you all for the answers, it doesn't look like we have an excessive amount of sickness given the department size, it just feels like it sometimes!!

not planning on doing anything

but yet

 I’m going to find out if HR have ever reported back to us that an employee has a lot of sickness

which is it?

Don't be a ****er manager just for the sake of it. The life of a human is tiny in comparison to the life of the world so do everything you can to make everyone's life a little better. Unless you're getting hounded to improve the sickness levels,.....just let it slide.

By that stage HR will have taken over

I disagree with that, managers manage their direct reports, HR creates the policies, ensures they are implemented and guides managers through the end stages. Responsibility for effective absence manager rests with the manager.

It does upset the genuine sick to be put thru a formal process

It can do but it's all about the way it's handled, absence management can equally be about speeding recovery, making sure the employee is not worrying about whether they can pay the mortgage or whether they have a job to come back to.

PS I treat everyone as genuinely sick, I'm not a medical professional so rely on the employee, their GP and Occ health to make that call. At the end of the day being sick too often stops you from doing your job and is grounds for termination. If I have reason to believe someone has pulled a sickie and i can prove it, that's misconduct, potentially gross misconduct and outside of absence management.

Absence from covid and reduced immunity to other respiratory bugs over the last ~2.5 years is bound to cause an uptick.

This.

I had my first sickness absence in nearly 30 years last month, Covid.

When I took over a decent sized team at our local NHS a few years ago I halved the sickness rate - mainly because my predecessor also took sick :-), but mainly because the first time someone in the team was sick under my watch I did a return-to-work meeting with them. Only 10 mins and I didn't record anything, but it put down a 'marker'. On the other side though when one of my staff needed a difficult operation I made sure she had the time she needed to prepare & recover (it was 'outside' policy, but I covered that).

And the place further up with the draconian policy, bet they've a high turnover of staff.

The only involvement that HR have ever had with excessive sickness at my current place is when the time reporting program triggers some sort of absence policy thats baked into the system.

Then they call the manager (not me anymore) and ask if theres any sort of indications that the employee needs any sort of support (reduced/changed working hours/help applying for carers allowance etc) or additional medical help arranging (mental health/physio/smoking/alcoholism etc etc).

Sacking for ill health is abut 3 years away at this point. And very difficult.

I used to work for a well known Scottish ferry company who paid 3 days pay for covering a day's absence. There were plenty of people working a "rota" knowing full well how much time they could take off without triggering serious markers in the Absence review system. "A" would cover "B" then it would be reciprocated at a later date.Normally these were the same people who, when offered the opportunity to work one week in four in lockdown, would magically be sick in the week they were supposed to be working.

I worked with a civil service team a while back. They monitored sickness days very closely and the union rep would come around and tell individuals that they were driving down the average and needed to ensure they took their ‘quota’ which was something like 8 days for that department. They saw it as part of their entitlement.

Don’t be a **** manager just for the sake of it. The life of a human is tiny in comparison to the life of the world so do everything you can to make everyone’s life a little better. Unless you’re getting hounded to improve the sickness levels,…..just let it slide.

Absolutely no intention of that at all.. again the original question was basically given the team size did we appear to have high sick rates?

It seems to be pretty much in line with what's expected.

Purely curiosity on my part, nothing more

I worked with a civil service team a while back

I've been in the civil service 19 years in various departments and roles, and I've only heard one person openly talk about "using their sick days". And she was roundly condemned for it by the rest of the team.

the union rep would come around and tell individuals that they were driving down the average

Why would the union rep have that info, much less down to individual records? That's personal info, if that is true then someone should be in a world of shit.

The union rep was also the HR admin for the department and it was pre-GDPR.

civil service

entitlement

Yep, sounds about right 😉

I’m never off sick so assume anyone who is is just taking the mickey.

I've had about 3 weeks in total over 30 years maybe - one of which was Covid in January.

However, I've sat next to people with young children at nursery and they seem to have colds/ flue for months at a time all year round....

Then you have colleagues with a whole host of medical problems (smoking, obesity, type 2 diabetes, etc) trapped in a spiral of crap lifestyle causes illness, illness reduces activity, reduced activity makes lifestyle even worse etc.

There is a system called the Bradford Score that lets you identify frequent short term absenteeism.

This man has it

..just let it slide.

Sorry, don't agree. Caring about your employees is what more managers should do and talking to them when they return from sickness is good. Trying to understand if there is an underlying problem or if work is in some way aggravating an issue is important. Just letting it slide because you think life is short is wrong.

On the original op I would look at 60 people like just over a year. 2 people off a week would be 2 days off in a bit over a year. I wouldn't be worried about that.

Then you have colleagues who try to keep fit but crash their bikes !

Own fault has been no days off, but a driver did put me off work 7 months. Fortunately, I had it built into my case that my employer got the sick pay back. That should have reset my sickness.

I suffered for a few years after that with severe back pain which lead to some days off. Touch wood, been fine last 3-4 years.

I also had a a simple op some 10 years ago which went wrong and needed additional surgery, but left me in pain for some time.

I was under the enhanced sickness reporting due to the time I'd had off with both incidents, but it was genuine, which is what your policy should allow for - it's not great having to be interviewed or your boss and HR person coming to your home, then finding you still in PJ's lying on the sofa (badly broken spine).

A good policy/line manager will find out if the sickness is genuine and help identify any on-going issues. It's also there to get the Monday morning lot.

Identifying patterns is more important with frequent illness. Is it genuine or is it being abused?

Treating everybody the same isn't quite fair so things like the bradford score aren't ideal.

Like if someone is generally ill or has a chronic condition then see what you can do to support.

One person would frequently be ill, or their child was ill every time there was a deadline. It's not been fair on the rest of the team who have to pick up the pieces but that was a training, time management issue that needed to be dealt with, rather than disciplining.

Work for a large uk holiday company and their sick policy is simple ... no work no pay ... simples ! ... had covid earlier in the year, off for a week, got zip all
Enjoy it if its needed but don't take the piss 🙂

For all those working for companies that don't pay for sick days, do you think this is a good thing?

I think in most of my jobs, if I'd not been paid for sick days I'd have been off more due to less guilt. Wake up in the morning, do the maths in your head, figure how much it'll cost for a day off... Bargain!

Unfortunately if employer's not paying sick, you'll go in with flu or covid. Seeing covid infections going up in work again and we're told WFH if not well, or if properly poorly, don't work.

Work for a large uk holiday company and their sick policy is simple … no work no pay … simples ! … had covid earlier in the year, off for a week, got zip all
Enjoy it if its needed but don’t take the piss 🙂

Strange Attitude tbh

Unfortunately if employer’s not paying sick, you’ll go in with flu or covid. Seeing covid infections going up in work again and we’re told WFH if not well, or if properly poorly, don’t work.

An ex manager of mine used to shout at contractors if they came in sick (no work, no pay) and pay them to go home.

The loss of man hours with FT staff going off sick more than made up for paying the contractors for going home.

Work for a large uk holiday company and their sick policy is simple … no work no pay … simples ! … had covid earlier in the year, off for a week, got zip all
Enjoy it if its needed but don’t take the piss 🙂

Think i know who is taking the piss in this scenario. And they're taking it a long way...

Three things:

1) To the OP - why should you care, in a big organisation it's HR's business to manage absence according to policy.

2) To those saying "three strikes and you're out" - there is a responsibility on the organisation to review once threshold triggers are hit, it may well be the case that they "can" issue a warning but this should not be the default approach. Rather, X instances of absence in Y timeframe should start a dialogue as to why. Does the employee have underlying health issues; do they require more support in the workplace; are they in fact actually taking the piss; and so forth. This is as much arse-covering as anything, you sack someone for absenteeism and they come back with "I was off with work-related stress and they sacked me" then you're in a world of shit.

3) To the "I've had one day off in 200 years" posters - big whoop, you might not have, but in dragging your diseased carcass into work out of some misplaced sense of pride or loyalty and then sitting their impotently like death warmed up until 5:29 you've probably caused weeks of lost time in the rest of the workforce you've infected. If you're sick, stay the hell home.

Think i know who is taking the piss in this scenario. And they’re taking it a long way…

Company I work for theoretically only pay SSP, but with a "flexible approach" so I've always been paid in full despite having some time off for illness, injury, family bereavement etc just means that none of the workforce is tempted to take the piss.

Then you’ve got the mickey takers.
Local council & a bloke at work who’s employed is never there. He knows exactly how to work the system & seemingly HR are either powerless or useless in sorting him out.
Apparently he has Crones disease or irritable bowel or something & that’s his excuse.
Doesn’t stop him getting plastered down the pub every night though, even when he’s off.