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How to tackle rising sickness rates

  • Can you afford a drop in service quality if someone goes off sick? The cost of missed deadlines, a poor review or the team needing to work harder to catch up can impact your company health as much as the health of your people.
  • What we can do for our collective workforces is support people not be sick in the first place.
  • Figures from the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) , which surveyed 233 employers about the impact of sickness absence and found they experienced:
  • reduced productivity (48.5%)
  • decline in service quality (36.5%)
  • decrease in morale among co-workers (31%)
  • increased direct and indirect financial implications (26%)
  • The same research shows what measures companies are putting in to enhance and promote employee health. This showed:
  • Just under half offered flexible work policies
  • Six in ten had no workplace safety measures such as health and safety training and/or guidance
  • Six in ten do not educate employees about health and wellbeing
  • Seven in ten have no Employee Assistance Programmes, counselling or mental health support
  • Seven in ten have no measures to monitor and manage workload
  • Seven in ten do not promote workplace physical hygiene
  • Employers have a legal and moral duty of care to ensure the health, safety, and well-being of their employees, known as a ‘duty of care’. This means employers must take all reasonable steps to protect employees from harm while at work.
  • The results taken together mean there are simple steps employers could take today to make improvements to the wellbeing of their people. The REC points out that only 13% of all the surveyed employers had no health-related measures at all.
  • The new Employment Rights Bill strengthens the support for individuals to thrive at work on top of existing measures from the Health and Safety Executive around duty of care. It is now more important than ever to ensure you have health-related support in place.
  • A physio appointment, a mental health call, a chat with a private GP or a health assessment could make the difference between someone going off sick and being able to stay healthy and productive.
  • We hear businesses are under cost pressures and struggle to justify a per-head subscription for cover ‘just in case’. That’s why we operate a pay-as-you-go system where you only pay for the appointments your employees use.
  • Let us help you address your sickness absence, and keep your employees healthy, happy and productive. FInd out more about Verve Healthcare On Demand services.
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