Charities do not suffer the high rates of absenteeism seen in the public sector, but that isn’t to say that those numbers can’t be reduced further. The latest National Survey of Absence Management Policy and Practice from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development shows that while the public sector average of days lost to sickness absence was 9.9 per employee, non-profit organisations generally had an average of 8.1, but for charities it was just 6.3. Nonetheless, with the average cost of sickness absence at £598 per employee per year, costs can be considerable.

And there is no ground for complacency. Ben Willmott, employee relations adviser at the CIPD, says the results for charities are very encouraging but he adds a caveat: “If you work in an organisation in the charity services sector and your absence rate is at that level you’re probably managing absence quite effectively. But the problem with managing absence is as soon as it ceases to become a management priority it can creep up, which is why you see absence rates yo-yo.”

New methods of managing absence are emerging which, while seemingly expensive, could potentially save charities money in the long-term through reduced absence. One such method is a system from Active Health Partners (AHP) which involves employees ringing in to AHP and speaking to a nurse, rather than calling in sick to their line manager. The nurse gives advice on the employee’s condition, suggesting they see a GP if they think it appropriate. This obviously also acts as a deterrent to people taking ‘sickies’.

So how do employees view this kind of service, which seems to imply a certain level of distrust of their staff by the employer? Most of AHP’s clients are unionised, says Gerry Callaghan, business relationship director, and they generally don’t like it at first.

“They see it as a big stick to beat employees back to work,” he says. “We explain it is a primary medical benefit. We are making sure people get back to work, back to health but also making sure that their absence is genuine. Invariably the union’s position changes once they see the service.”

But this kind of approach may not be right for all organisations, says Willmott. “If an organisation goes down that route they have to explain to employees what they are doing, why they are doing it and what they hope to achieve, and promote its positive aspects in terms of ‘this provides you with initial advice on your health’. The potential downside is employees see it as slightly prescriptive approach by the organisation.”

Though no charities have taken up the service so far, the company is in talks with some. Callaghan says that while charities may protest that they don’t have the budget for this, it is, in fact, very cost effective.

Rather than using this kind of intervention to reduce absence, another more preventative way of addressing the issue is through benefits – either by providing private medical insurance to get staff back to work quickly once they have a health problem, or to encourage them to stay healthy by offering subsidised gym membership or other wellness initiatives. But the non-profit sector lags in offering these kinds of benefits.

Just under a third of non-profit organisations provide some kind of private health insurance for some categories of staff, compared with 77 per cent of private service organisations and 71 per cent of manufacturing and production companies. Subsidised gym membership was even less popular, offered by around a quarter of the non-profit sector.

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So far the UK has trailed the US in analysis of the effect of offering these benefits in reducing sickness absence. The Prudential is one company which has trialled this, and produced some interesting results. It ran two pilot schemes, one for 100 people in the customer service and IT departments and the second for 500 people on one site.

The schemes involved a mini health screening, online health assessments from vielife health consultancy, team sessions of lifestyle coaching, and a nutrition programme. In the first pilot the average absence rate dropped from six to two days a year per employee, while in the second short-term absence was reduced by 11 per cent.

But not all charities have a particular problem with absence. The Ramblers Association, for instance, is obviously doing something right. It has an enviable sickness absence rate of just 2.8 days a year, according to its latest figures, in a workforce of 63 people. They work across three sites in administration, IT, finance, marketing, campaigning, and research functions.

HR manager Fiona Syme puts these exemplary figures down to the level of commitment from the staff: “We work in very small teams and that helps because there is a knock-on effect if one person out of a team of two is unable to come to work. There is tremendous loyalty to the team and the work they do because of how strongly people feel about the cause.” And by its nature the organisation is actively promoting fitness. “Part of it might be that people are generally fit, healthy active people,” adds Syme.

Though offering benefits as a means to manage absence is obviously not an issue, the Ramblers Association has considered a wider benefits package. It already has a generous pension scheme, and staff get a subsidy on Ramblers Holidays after a year’s service. The organisation started to review the benefits a couple of years ago because some people were not using the holiday entitlement, and others showed no interest in the generous pension scheme. It has not acted on the review, however, because it isn’t a priority.

Looking back at the Association’s low rate of absenteeism, this could also have something to do with the size of the organisation. Research from the CIPD shows that smaller organisations have a lower rate of absence than larger ones.

A larger organisation like Oxfam, with a 1,700 strong UK workforce, has an absence rate which is in line with the average for the sector of five days a year per employee. While short-term absence within the organisation remains constant, long-term absence is, in fact, reducing.

Catherine Layton, HR adviser, employee relations, puts this down to the intervention of a staff health team: “The involvement of the staff health team has been key by being more proactive, and intervening earlier on. They have conversations on the phone with absent staff and say for example, ‘you have been off sick for four months, we are concerned and this is what we suggest’.”

She says that staff members mostly react positively to this intervention: “They are glad we are taking an interest – they want to get better.”

Though Oxfam has considered private medical insurance, this has been rejected on cost grounds, but in certain circumstances the charity will pay for private care, say to get a private diagnosis, and earlier treatment to get someone back to work sooner.

“If someone has back pain so they can’t go to work, and if they waited for NHS physiotherapy and it would take six months, then we do have small budget to give people immediate physiotherapy,” says Layton. “The idea is that we get money back because we don’t have to pay sick pay. We are certainly interested in the bottom line.”

As a further example, the absence record of Hertfordshire based Isabel Hospice is close to the average for the charity sector at around six days a year per employee. Short-term absence is not a major issue; long-term sickness is more so because the hospice employs a lot of nurses who face specific health problems.

“A majority of employees are nurses and a major reason why they are off is for muscular skeletal problems,” says HR manager Janet Webster. “Patients are physically dependent, so nurses have training in handling and mobilising patients but back pain is an occupational hazard. Nurses with a muscular skeletal problem often have to be off for long periods.”

The hospice manages this long-term sickness through phased returns, where nurses are referred to the occupational health department, and a programme of reduced hours, shorter shifts and (if they are part time, which many are) organising the rotas so that they are not working two successive days over a period of two to three weeks.

Offering private medical insurance is not an option because of budget limits, nor is offering private physiotherapy for the same reasons. But lack of employee benefits is compensated by a supportive management and a caring culture, says Webster: “We care for people who are terminally ill so our culture is about caring. We are supportive of staff who have their own caring responsibilities and need to adjust their hours of working.”

And this seems to back up CIPD’s Willmott’s conclusion: “Whatever you do on employee benefits it won’t have a positive effect unless people are managed properly and treated fairly to create a positive work culture where people feel they fulfil their potential.”

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