The World Cup and Employment Law

The nation is being gripped by football fever - bringing excitement, patriotism and........ a potential headache for employers. It has become a fairly well known phenomenon that during a major sporting tournament sickness absences tend to increase. According to one survey 32% of people would consider calling in sick to watch an important game. If England does manage to get through the first rounds then the likelihood of employees taking time off to watch key games will also increase.

So what can employers do? There are some basic steps you can take to ensure that employees do not claim to be sick when in fact they are just interested in the footie:

If you are a particularly generous employer you could allow a television in the work place to enable employees to watch the game. This has the advantage of building team spirit, although it will also, inevitably, mean that employees are not as focussed on their work.

Alternatively, you could allow staff flexibility in their working hours, meaning they could start or finish later to allow them to watch a game at home – but still be at work for a core number of hours.

You can encourage people to book holiday in advance if they there is a particular game they want to watch. This means you can control the number of people off work at any one time, and has the advantage of letting employees know that you are aware there is a game on and you are keeping an eye open!

The most important way to manage absence is to have in place a reliable method for recording and monitoring sickness absence amongst employees. If you have a clear procedure then any breach of that procedure will enable you to take disciplinary action. You can also consider implementing special measures for during the World Cup, for example having a designated manager to take all calls relating to sickness over this period and asking a few key questions on symptoms, or perhaps a return to work interview. These measures will discourage absence from work for a reason that is not genuine.

If a pattern of absence is found to exist (coinciding with key games) then you can consider disciplinary action (provided they were not absent for a reason connected with a disability). You should however be aware that some people will be genuinely sick – and of course not everyone likes football!

If you would like any further information on sickness absence please contact Marsha Robinson.

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Marsha Robinson
or phone 01245 216114