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Personnel Today

Absence rate rises for first time in five years

by Personnel Today 29 Jun 2004
by Personnel Today 29 Jun 2004


The average worker took 7.2 days off sick in 2003, equating to 176 million days across the economy – 3.2 per cent of working time per employee.

The CBI’s survey of 530 organisations, Room for Improvement, shows the average of 7.2 days a year is slightly higher than the 6.8 days reported in 2002, and is the first increase in the rate of absence for five years.

It is too early to know whether this rise means absence rates are beginning to stabilise following years of decline.

The best performing 25 per cent of employers have average absence rates of 2.9 days a year, while the worst have rates of at least 12.2 days.

There appears to have been an increase in the number of employers operating rehabilitation policies in recent years – up from 28 per cent in 2001, to 62 per cent in 2003. These include counselling, flexible work and medical treatment.  

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Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

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