Dealing with Absenteeism in the Workplace

NATIONAL

Persistent employee absenteeism can present costs to Members in terms of personal/carer’s leave payments, the cost and effort of engaging replacement employees and the administrative burden of processing excessive absences. Absenteeism can also impact workplace culture and morale and affect the operational efficiency of Members’ businesses.

In order to take steps to prevent and reduce employee absenteeism in the workplace, it is important first to understand what absenteeism is and how we can obtain more information from employees regarding their absences.

What is absenteeism?

Absenteeism refers to frequent or consistent lateness or absences from work due to illness or injuries or other personal reasons, such as carer responsibilities. It also includes employees engaging in unauthorised lateness or absences, such as deliberately failing to commence work at the required time, failing to attend work or failing to meet the requirements for taking leave, such as not providing a medical certificate when required.

Why does absenteeism occur?

Absenteeism may be attributed to various issues, such as: • Family, marital or household issues; • Personal illness or injury including mental health conditions and drug and alcohol-related issues; • Poor work-life balance; • Deliberate non-compliance with

Employer policies and expectations; • Workplace bullying and harassment; • Lack of job satisfaction or poor workplace culture. It is important that employees are permitted to take approved leave (e.g. personal/carer’s leave and annual leave) when this is in accordance with the Employer’s policies and procedures, and adverse action should not be taken against employees that do take approved leave. However, where such leave is frequent, persistent or unauthorised, absenteeism may become an issue to be addressed in the appropriate ways.

It may also be helpful for Members to assess whether there is a pattern of absenteeism across all employees, as this can be indicative of a poor workplace culture that tolerates absenteeism. This may involve collecting data on the patterns of absences and categorising absences. Doing so can reveal trends in absences in the business, such as long-term illnesses, Monday sickies or absences around holidays.

Reducing absenteeism

Implementing the following may assist Members in reducing absenteeism in the workplace: • Foster a positive workplace culture that is non-tolerant of absenteeism; • Implement clear and detailed policies and procedures that outline expectations surrounding lateness, absenteeism, use of personal/carers and annual leave; • Introduce systems to recognise employee achievement; • Take appropriate disciplinary action

to address lateness, improper use of leave or non-compliance with policies and procedures; • Engage in fair and consistent treatment of employees, particularly when applying workplace policies or when taking disciplinary action; and • Provide employees with avenues to raise grievances and having transparent processes to deal with any issues that arise fairly.

Long term illnesses or injuries

Absenteeism should be handled with care if it is due to long-term personal illnesses or injuries. It may become evident that due to personal illness or injury, the employee is unable to perform the inherent requirements of their role. Taking adverse actions, such as dismissal, against an employee who has taken personal leave or has a disability or chronic/long term illness carries general protections risks. There is also the usual unfair dismissal risks to consider when terminating an employee.

Members are also prohibited from dismissing a national system employee that is temporarily absent because of illness or injury that is supported by reasonable evidence and if the absence is for less than three months in a 12 month period. Further, state-based workers’ compensation legislation also provides protections from dismissal where an employee is entitled to workers’ compensation payments.