Absent staff: is it swine flu or a godsend for skivers?

Employment specialists at a leading law firm are getting calls from employers concerned that workers might be sneaking off work citing government advice as an excuse.

Leading employment lawyer John Cook of SAS Daniels LLP, Cheshire’s biggest law firm, with offices in Stockport, Macclesfield, Chester, Congleton, and Bramhall, says companies are beginning to worry whether sickness claims are true.

“It’s a double whammy: there is the worry that there is potentially Swine Flu in the company, but there is also the worry that it may not be,” said John Cook.

“This is causing massive difficulties from a number of directions – although I sympathise with the victims of illness and absence.

“But you do have the skivers claiming illness and staying at home, you have the employers who can virtually predict which employees will use the government stay-away advice as a reason for unjustified absence, and you have possibly the most dangerous of all: those staff who are committed and loyal, have the bug, but will return to work before they’re fully recovered and potentially infect the whole workforce because of their enthusiasm.

“As soon as the government gave the advice to stay away from work – and stay away from GPs – the nation’s living rooms would have come alive with skiving gamers sitting at home for three days.

“Because self-certificated sick notes now operate for up to five working days there is no real way that employers can actually check whether their missing staff are fighting flu or an alien invasion on their Wii – thousands are abusing sickness absence procedures claiming they have the bug.

“The problem is that all those unjustified absence workshy skivers know that they are protected by legislation, and now Christmas has come early for them as well -as the government tells them to stay away both from work, and the people who can tell them they’re actually OK to work: their GPs.”