BrightHR Research Reveals UK Employee Absence and Lateness Trends in 2018

MANCHESTER, England, January 21, 2019 /PRNewswire/ --

• Bath was the city with the highest staff sickness
• Newcastle upon Tyne was the city with the lowest staff sickness
• The average time staff turned up late to work was 36 minutes
• Wednesday was the most popular day of the week to call into work sick
• Dave and Sarah were the male and female names most likely to take a sick day
• January was the month with the highest level of sickness
• 77% of employees had unused holiday left over by the end of 2018

2018 was a rollercoaster of a year. The start of the year saw the cold wave of Beast from the East hit the UK, then we all got swept up in World Cup fever and were treated to one of the hottest summers in over a decade.

But how did these events affect how late and absent UK employees were from their workplaces?

HR software and support service, BrightHR have examined their data and found some surprising results. These results can help businesses get prepared for the year ahead and avoid the dreaded question… where is everyone?

BrightHR Chief Technical Officer, Alistair Brown, comments on the key findings:

"This year's data has been able to give us a real insight into employees' absence and lateness. One surprising discovery was that Wednesday, not Monday, was the day that most employees were late to work on, what we now call, wake-up-late Wednesday.

"With line issues and the timetable chaos in the summer, it's easy to see why 'transport' was the most used reason for arriving to work late, with 'traffic' only just beating 'sleeping in.'

"Sickness skyrocketed in January, in comparison to the rest of the months in the year, with almost double the amount of users calling in sick. Whether employees were genuinely unwell or had a serious case of January blues will remain unknown.

"There's also some bad news if you have a Dave or Sarah in your workplace, as those were the two names that had the most days off sick in 2018.

"Worryingly, by the end of 2018, 77% of employees had unused holiday left over, which has been a worrying presenteeism trend as employees aren't getting the rest they require to properly fulfil their jobs.

"In terms of annual leave, August was the most popular month for employees to take off as holiday, as temperatures reached highs of 30 degrees throughout the UK.

"Interestingly, the morning after England's 2-1 defeat to Croatia in the World Cup semi-final saw the highest number of annual leave cancellations as 10% of holidays booked for the day after the World Cup final had been cancelled by 10 am.

"To summarise, from BrightHR's findings, we can see that good absence management is imperative for a business as it can increase efficiency and reduce the impact of day-to-day staff absences.

"The right HR software can be used as a tool for a better connection between yourself and your employees. It can help create a working environment, where staff are highly motivated and where they're also able to be honest about any time off that they might need. It will also save you from a flood of paper holiday forms handed in at the start of each year, as staff start to plan their activities for the summer months and you will no longer have to ask… where is everybody?"

Editors notes:
https://pages.brighthr.com/how-britain-took-time-off-2018.html

BrightHR is the UK's most popular HR software and support service. Their cloud-based software offers users single place to record their employees' absences, respond to annual leave requests and make shifts and rotas.

Contact:
Jane Pearson
+44(0)161-830-2400
+44(0)7966112032
jane.pearson@brighthr.com