How to Reduce Sickness Absence in the Workplace?
Picture this, you’re a Restaurant Manager setting up for a busy Saturday night, when suddenly you get a text saying that your star chef is sick, and it’s by no means the first time! Yet again you are left with one trainee chef on duty.
Your customers arrive and end up waiting over an hour for their food. One of your waiting staff is in tears, already having to cover for their colleague who also texted in sick at the last minute!
Half of your guests leave without paying because of the poor service and let rip on Trip Advisor. Both the waiting staff member and trainee chef resign at the end of the night, saying that the job is just too stressful.
You wonder how it got to this, but the signs may have already been there…….
If sickness absence is not managed effectively, it can have a domino effect on the efficiency of your operation and be very costly. Last year, 185 million working days were lost in the UK due to sickness.
However, using a few simple techniques, you can quickly and effectively minimise staff sickness absence.
The legals
Firstly, before undertaking management of absence, make sure you understand the legal framework. The main legal principle you must understand is Disability Discrimination which is part of the Equality Act 2010.
In some cases, an employee’s absences will be linked to an underlying health condition, which could be classed as a disability under the Equality Act.
A disability is a physical or mental impairment that has lasted or is likely to last more than 12 months, and has a substantial, adverse effect on their ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities. As you can imagine this can cover a multitude of conditions, not all of which are obvious.
There are some conditions that are automatically classed as a disability, such as cancer, visual impairment and multiple sclerosis, and some that are not classified as disabilities in themselves, such as alcohol and drug addiction, but which could be a factor in another disability.
Fundamentally it is unlawful to treat someone less favourably due to a disability. This could include indirect discrimination where an absence policy that is applied equally to all, has a disproportionate adverse impact on a disabled person. For example someone whose disability, by its nature, will always cause a certain level of unavoidable sickness absence.
In addition, if an employee has a disability, you have a duty to make reasonable adjustments to support them in carrying out their work. This might be agreeing to reduce their hours, offering them alternative shifts, allowing them to work from home etc. It is advisable to do this with input from a medical professional unless the adjustments are mutually agreed as beneficial.
So, once you are happy you understand the possible legal banana skins, here are some important areas of absence management to consider.
Calling in sick
There are now so many ways to call in sick; text, email, WhatsApp, Facebook messenger, snapchat, slack, MS Teams message etc. So, it is no surprise that left unchecked, staff will use them. However, by doing so it removes the first absence management check point, that is a conversation with your manager.
If you currently allow calling in sick by electronic message, we suggest you stop and insist that staff call in sick personally by telephone, so that you can talk to them about it at the earliest opportunity. You should only accept a call from a family member if the employee is too ill to pick up the phone.
Clearly you will not want someone pressurised into coming in coughing and sneezing and infecting the team, but you may find that those who are borderline, perhaps tired or hung over may come in rather than have to endure that conversation. You may achieve the same result, if you are unlucky enough to have employed someone who uses sickness absence as “short notice holiday”!
So, have a policy that makes it mandatory to call in sick by telephone to a manager. Ensure the policy is in writing and also makes clear that staff should provide you with sufficient notice before their scheduled start time, so you can arrange cover where necessary. A must for our restaurant manager who otherwise may have to put the chef’s apron on themselves!
During the phone call confirm and write down :-
- The symptoms that are causing the employee to be unfit for work. It’s Ok to probe if this is vague, such as “feeling unwell” or “feeling tired”.
- How long they think they may be off for.
- If they have spoken to their GP and what was the advice.
- An agreed level of contact whilst off sick.
If your “calling in” policy is written down and clear, failing to adhere to it, without good reason, becomes misconduct and can be dealt with under your disciplinary procedure.
In our experience, insisting on phoning in sick rather than messaging will help prevent a lot of non-genuine or borderline sickness, as most employees won’t welcome the idea of embellishing or lying to their manager, over the phone.
Know your numbers
You would be surprised at the number of organisations that fail to record sickness absence. It is important that you do so, not only to ensure you are paying staff the right level of sick pay, but to also spot and act consistently upon patterns of absence. For example, the “long weekender” who is regularly sick on Fridays or Mondays, or someone who tends to be off just after pay-day or those that seem to be off more frequently in the summer, or school holidays.
There are some great HR systems out there that make recording employee absence very simple. We recommend BreatheHR as a user friendly and affordable system for smaller organisations. However, if you do not have the budget for a full HR system an Excel spreadsheet can also do the job when employee numbers are low.
Recording employee absence will allow you to notice if the numbers get too high, as well as identifying any patterns.
If you spot a pattern of absence, ensure that you quickly have a conversation with the employee to find out what the cause is. Ask if there is an underlying health condition that may be the cause and if they have spoken to their GP. If neither, then encourage them to seek medical advice, or if the pattern continues for an extended period, seek their consent to write to their GP or arrange an occupational health assessment.
The simple fact that you have noticed the pattern, may be enough to reduce the sickness levels, particularly combined with the need for the employee to call in by phone and explain their absence each time.
Return to work
The professional body for the HR sector (CIPD) describes the “Return to Work Interview” as one of the most effective ways of managing absence.
In short, it is a documented conversation held with an employee following a period of absence. It sounds a bit time consuming calling it an interview, but it may just be a few minutes over a coffee.
In most cases it will be nothing more sinister than a conversation about the employee’s wellbeing. During the discussion the manager should explore the reason for the employee’s absence, whether they sought medical advice, whether the absence was related to an underlying health condition or disability, and confirm they now feel fit to return to work.
Having a discussion after each absence will make it clear to your employees that absences are noticed, are being actively managed and again will help discourage borderline or dishonest absences.
Most absences are genuine, and you must always start with that premise unless there is evidence to the contrary. The return-to-work discussion provides an opportunity to address any underlying condition or disability. For example, if the employee is frequently taking time off due to stress, then the discussion will give you an opportunity to explore this in more depth, and where the stress is work related you can make adjustments to the role or environment. This is critical if the stress is a symptom of a long-term mental health condition that could fit the disability definition.
Consistency is important so as not to risk discrimination, and time should always be found to hold these discussions with every employee, after every absence, regardless of its length.
When enough is enough
There will come a point when an employee’s absences reach an unacceptable level and require action to address their overall sickness record. This is sometimes called a “trigger point”.
The “trigger point” could be where a number of sick days is reached within a certain period. However, this will include long periods of sickness as well as frequent short-term absence, which are very different and have a different impact on the organisation. Frequent short-term absence can be far more disruptive than a single long period of absence where a strategy for cover can be put in place.
There is a formula that is sometimes used to focus on frequent short-term absence called the “Bradford Factor”. Frequent short-term absence can be debilitating for an organisation, as would be testified by our restaurant manager, as it creates uncertainty and the need to be constantly juggling resources to provide cover. It also affects the morale of colleagues.
The “Bradford Factor” addresses short term absence by giving frequent short-term absences a higher weighting in its calculation. It considers the number of individual sick days alongside the length of each absence and provides a numeric score.
So, for example, someone with 5 individual absences of 1 day each, will have a higher “Bradford Factor” score than someone absent for 1 working week due to a single illness. Using the “Bradford Factor” score as a trigger point, the employer can prioritise action on frequent short term absence on the basis that it is more disruptive.
The Bradford Factor is a useful tool where frequent short-term absences are particularly damaging to the operation, as in our restaurant example.
Trigger points should be clear and unambiguous and managed consistently. This ensures there are no surprises when someone hits the threshold. It is also recommended that absence due to disability or pregnancy is discounted in any calculation of trigger points. This will minimise the risk of the “trigger point” policy being indirectly discriminatory to pregnant or disabled employees.
What if there is no improvement?
Even if you have provided all the support, you can, it may be that eventually even genuine sickness gets to a level that is untenable for the employer.
If an employee reaches an absence trigger point, this might signal the beginning of a formal sickness process, where formal warnings are given, and the employee is eventually dismissed.
You will of course need to give the employee the opportunity, with your support to reduce their absence levels. However, although unpalatable, genuine sickness absence may eventually be a fair reason to dismiss an employee, ie for reason of “capability”.
If you have an employee who has a poor sickness record and improvements are not being seen, and you have given all the support you can, taken medical advice to no avail, you may have no option but to formally warn the employee that failure to improve, may result in dismissal, and ultimately terminate their employment.
The same applies to employees who are off on long term sick leave.
The golden rules when contemplating termination of employment for capability are:-
- Seek professional medical advice. Before starting a formal process, you should seek the employees consent to you applying for a medical report from their GP or arranging an occupational health assessment.
- Seek professional HR advice, particularly if there is any possibility the employee may be disabled. If you eventually terminate employment for reason of capability an employee could claim unfair dismissal or disability discrimination, the latter having uncapped compensation. If involved early, your HR professional will be able to outline a process for you, to minimise the risk of a tribunal claim.
Final thoughts
It sometimes feels like nothing can be done when employees are frequently off sick, but having a clear absence management policy can act as a preventative measure and provide a framework for dealing with those who have high levels of sickness, thus improving overall attendance levels, increasing productivity, and reducing costs.
Although this article can act as a starting point for managing absence, it is no substitute for professional advice, as every case is unique and the risk of getting it wrong, especially where disability discrimination is involved, can be costly.
Target HR can provide you with absence management templates including a sickness absence policy as well as advice on your absence management strategy, and individual cases.
If you have any questions on the article or would like help in managing sickness absence, please get in touch.
Luke Potton (Managing Consultant)
Target HR and Training Ltd