How to deal with frequent sickies

Employee absence has a huge impact on your organisation. It affects staff morale, disrupts the work of others, and reduces the quality of work outputs. Absences carry costs, risks and productivity hits for your business.

Generally speaking, you cannot dismiss or discipline an employee for being absent due to sickness. Doing this may expose you to a claim of unfair dismissal, discrimination or unlawful termination, so this needs to be handled carefully and properly to reduce your risk of future complications.

To control the impact of absenteeism, you need to:

• see trends so you can control costs,
• manage your policies so you can minimise compliance risk, and
• identify workers with attendance issues so you can improve workforce productivity.

Here are a few sample ideas for you to consider implementing –you will find that simply announcing these measures to employees will reduce the number of sickies in your workplace.

• Identify the causes for an employee’s absenteeism. If you can find out why an employee is consistently absent, you can deal more effectively with the problem. Look for patterns in their absences.
•  Implement a thorough record system, including the date, duration and reason for each case. It is useful to set parameters for further action, ie after 4 absences in a 6 month period, meet with the employee to discuss further. Ensure that the employees are aware you are monitoring absences.   
•  It is also important that all employees know who they have to inform if they are off sick.  25% of employers now accept text or email messages about sickness, but a personal phone call makes it more difficult for the employee to fake illness.
•  Hold return to work interviews after every absence. This is a proven method of reducing sickness absence, especially for companies employing fewer than 250 people.
•  Your employee should be given a chance to improve their attendance levels before you begin disciplinary action. You should give clear documented warnings at every stage of the possible consequences of continued absences. If there is no improvement despite formal warnings, then dismissal is an option as a last resort.

It is advisable to speak to an HR Adviser at an early stage as the process must be handled carefully, fairly and consistently. This will ensure that you avoid employment tribunal claims of unfair dismissal or disability discrimination.