With presenteeism, where people come into work even though they are ill, on the rise, it is vital that businesses start thinking about how to react if their staff are swamped by a round of the flu virus. 

 

Flu symptoms include fever, aches, exhaustion and vomiting, as well as ear pain in children. It is generally more severe than a cold, and the symptoms can appear very quickly. 

 

The best prevention is the flu vaccine, which is free to certain people, but all employees can help to improve their environment by washing their hands regularly with soap and water, covering their mouth and nose when they sneeze, and cleaning surfaces which could harbour infection. 

 

For example, workplace surfaces which should be cleaned regularly and thoroughly during a flu outbreak include: 

 

• Telephones: mouthpieces and where the hand sits, also dialpad/touchscreens.

• Keyboard and mice

• Door handles/push pads

• Any communal mugs

 

It is important for companies to monitor and manage their absence rates, especially during periods such as winter where viruses are constantly circulating. 

 

Source: Cambridge News

 

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Our time and attendance management system allows employees to register themselves as off ill using the web or mobile-based Self Service Module (SSM). The mobile version of this module enables you to plot the GPS location of your employee’s phone on a map, meaning that if you have suspicions about their illness you can make sure they were at home when they checked in. 

 

You can manage large numbers of employees’ absences using our system, as we have a robust monitoring and warning system which can alert you to problems with absenteeism and manning levels. 

 

The system automatically calculates each employee’s Bradford Factor, which is a numerical score based on the number of short-term absences they have had. While many employers believe that lots of short-term absences are a sign of malingering, during flu season it can be a sign of presenteeism, when somebody has dragged themselves back to work before they are ready, exhausted themselves and needed another day or two off to recover. It is worth making sure that your HR practises (such as not paying any sick pay or having very low thresholds for “acceptable” numbers of absences) are not encouraging workers to make unsafe, infectious choices in this risky period.