There is a lot of talk about absence management among Human Resources professionals, but talk only goes so far. While most companies have an absence policy, less than a quarter of them record and monitor absences. Without absence data, there can be no effective absence management.
A major way record keeping can improve absence management is by providing employers with potential solutions. The data can show patterns that allow employers to develop a response plan for different types of absences. For example, musculoskeletal problems are one of the main causes for absences. If an employer creates a way for rapid access to physiotherapy after an injury, they can reduce the amount of time an employee requires before returning to work.
Absence records can also help identify habitually absent employees. For instance, an employee may call out sick every year right before a major holiday or busy season. While this employee may have a legitimate seasonal health issue, the data can provide employers with a starting point. The employer can then investigate the legitimacy of these absences and determine ways to help mitigate their frequency.
Knowledge is power. The right data can help employers learn why their staff takes time off and how to manage those absences. Contact Actec for custom solutions to meet your absence management needs.
Tag: absence management
Manage Absences with Preventative Care Incentives
There are a variety of reasons an employee may use their paid time off (PTO). They might be sick, their child may be ill, or a family member may have passed. No matter how legitimate, an employee absence can be expensive and disruptive. While employers cannot mitigate all causes of absences, they can do something about their employees’ health.
Many employees do not feel comfortable taking PTO for a preventative care visit. As a result, they are more prone to illnesses that could have been avoided. Some employees even feel that their company would frown upon them making a preventative care appointment during work hours. This means the vast majority of the workforce is attempting to schedule these appointments after work. This leaves little opportunity to secure a doctor’s visit.
To change this perception and reduce the likelihood of employees falling ill, some employers are instituting an Unsick Day as part of their PTO. Employees would have access to PTO specifically for preventative care appointments. By dedicating a day to seeking preventative care, employers can reduce the amount of time employees will need to take off for a preventable illness. They will also save on the associated cost with extended employee absences.
Many employers have wellness programs and want their employees to use their given healthcare. This benefits both parties as employers have a consistent workforce and employees are not dealing with avoidable illnesses. However, many employees do not seize upon these opportunities. To learn more ways to reduce employee absences due to illness and improve absence management, contact the professionals at Actec.
Top Absence Reporting Blog Posts
Absence reporting has grown more important and more frequently discussed with each passing year. As leave requirements and labor costs increase, the methods of logging and tracking employee absences are crucial factors in controlling costs and maintaining compliance. Actec Systems writes a wide variety of blog posts on the subject. Here are 5 of the most important:
Get Your Company’s Intermittent Leave Under Control
One of the most difficult leaves to manage from a Human Resource and management standpoint is FMLA Intermittent Leave. With employees on a reduced work schedule, employers often find it difficult to preserve productivity, managers struggle to keep a shift adequately staffed, and HR has difficulty accurately maintaining the employee’s FMLA leave bank. If your company can get intermittent leave under control, your organization will be able to maintain compliance while returning to optimum levels of productivity.
FMLA Intermittent Leave
Most employees will leave for a specific period of time if they are sick or injured. Once they are better, these employees will return to work and resume their duties without complications.
In some instances, however, an injury or illness will require an employee to take multiple leaves of absence. In addition, when the employee is at work, they may not be able to work their standard number of hours in a workweek or be able to complete all of their duties. For example, if the employee was full time before their injury, they may need to become part-time while they recover from their injury. They may also have to leave for several surgeries and spend time away from work to recuperate.
Employers find this type of intermittent absence one of the most difficult FMLA leaves to track for compliance and productivity. In fact, two-thirds of HR managers rank FMLA Intermittent leave as the most difficult to track and maintain.
One Call Solution
By creating a reporting system where employees can call in absences, companies can streamline their absence management process. And by using software that can report an intermittent leave absence and apply it to the employee’s FMLA leave bank, the company is one step closer to getting administration and compliance under control.
FMLA Intermittent leave takes planning, organization and a proactive strategy to maintain efficient employee utilization. To help learn how to get our company’s intermittent leave under control, contact the experts at Actec today.
What A Rubber Stamp Absence Policy Costs Your Business
Many companies struggle with aligning absence management, employee efficiency, and legal compliance. This often leads to a “rubber stamp” mentality when dealing with FMLA and state leave issues. What employers frequently fail to understand is that such policies this policy is a direct result of absence abuse and loss of company productivity.
FMLA Litigation Costs
Litigation in FMLA cases costs an average of $78,000. This leads businesses to believe that they need to avoid a potential lawsuit at all costs. Rubber stamping FMLA leave requests seems like a less expensive solution to the problem.
Unique Leave Requirements
Another factor in creating a rubber stamp policy is the fact that approximately 95% of employees work in a state that has unique leave requirements. This makes managing and tracking leave entitlements difficult, especially if the company has offices in more than one state. When management becomes too complicated, granting an employee’s leave request seems like the easiest solution.
An Alternative to Rubber Stamp Policies
The money that a rubber stamp policy costs in productivity loss and employee efficiency can cost some organizations far more than the possible litigation of an FMLA case.
The first step in creating an effective absence management strategy is an absence audit to determine if revisions are necessary. One of the first signs of a potential rubber stamp issue is an existence of absence abuse. If HR doesn’t investigate an employee’s state or FMLA absence request, this can encourage an increase in false claims.
If the audit shows that your company needs to revise its current legal compliance policy, then you need to design a system that can manage and track all leave entitlements. This will help to reduce false claims and help to show your company is in compliance with all requirements.
A comprehensive absence tracking and management system can help you replace your rubber stamp policy with a strategy that will manage unique leave requirements and employee productivity. Contact the experts at Actec to learn more.
Benefits of New Absence Management Strategies
At a recent HR conference, corporations like Pepsi Co explained the benefits they have seen by creating a cohesive absence management strategy.
Corporations aren’t the only organizations that silo their absence management, disability programs and other Human Resource tasks. Whether you are an organization of 50 employees or 5,000, separating HR functions can lead to:
- Duplicate forms to satisfy all regulatory requirements
- Inefficiencies in returning employees to work after their leave has expired
- HR staff struggling to track all the different types of leave
These inefficiencies also lead to drop in their revenue. Pepsi Co and other organizations merged their absence with disability management in order to coordinate claims tracking, integrate lost time data and implement best practices across all HR operations.
The result:
- A reduction in overall costs
- An understanding of employee leave and absence drivers
- A company-wide increase in productivity
Another step in this integration process was to establish a centralized reporting center. The call center offers employees a phone number that will connect them with a representative capable of tracking all absence types and answering any absence-related questions.
You don’t have to be a large corporation to leverage an integrated absence management program. Contact the experts at Actec to learn what an integrated call center can do for your business.
Webinar: FMLA & Total Absence Management – Turning a Weakness into an Opportunity
In this Actec Systems educational webinar subject matter experts John Hearn and Michael Godwin review practical strategies and solutions to logistical challenges in absence management and absence reporting. From administrative retroactive adjustments to compliance inconsistencies and poor clinical handoffs, absence management programs can cause difficulty for even the most organized businesses. Pinpoint your organization’s challenges as we review the following topics:
* Practical absence process vs. compliance details
* Understanding perspectives of various stakeholders
* Identifying and circumventing industry limitations
* Seeing the bigger picture regarding absence management
For a copy of the slides, click here. To learn more about absence reporting, contact us.
You May Not Have a Handle on FMLA
Adhering to the Family and Medical Leave Act is a management issue for many employers. If you think that you have a handle on FMLA management, you may be wrong. Most companies run into issues with FMLA compliance, and those issues can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Three Common FMLA Issues
There are three main areas where many companies struggle with FMLA compliance.
Those areas are:
- Determining if an employee has a qualifying health condition
- Deciphering State and Federal leave laws
- Tracking FMLA intermittent absences
Unknown FMLA Facts
Here are some other facts you may not realize about FMLA management:
- Tracking FMLA related absences makes up 6% of payroll costs
- The Department of Labor initiates 43% of FMLA related investigations
- If a company loses a FMLA case, it can cost over $500,000
Managing FMLA absences is important to maintain compliance. Even if you feel you have intermittent and extended absence management under control, your company may not be handling them in an efficient manner.
Effective absence management requires a comprehensive strategy and an effective way to track and manage all absences. Contact the experts at Actec to learn how they can help you track absences and ensure compliance with the Family and Medical Leave Act.
Webinar: FMLA & Absence Management – Processes to Drive Compliance
Join Actec Systems for this educational webinar as subject matter experts John Hearn and Michael Godwin review practical strategies and solutions to logistical challenges in absence management and absence reporting. From “notification leakage” to compliance inconsistencies and poor clinical handoffs, absence management programs can cause difficulty for even the most organized businesses. Pinpoint your organization’s challenges as we review the following topics:
- Practical absence processes to support compliance
- Managing the perspectives of various internal stakeholders
- Identifying and circumventing industry limitations
- Big picture process design to support absence management
Two Sessions Held Thursday, May 12th:
11:00 AM – 11:30 AM EDT
2:00 PM – 2:30 PM EDT
Space is limited – use this link to register:
https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/rt/3407114229344092420
Absence Management Silo Strategies May Create Inefficiencies
A current trend in absence and compensation management is to create work silos. When companies separate workers compensation and disability leave programs, it can create efficient teams within your human resource department. However, not unifying your absence management strategies may create inefficiencies that can lead to a loss in revenue.
Separate May Not Be Equal
When you separate benefit programs there can be unifying data your company is missing. This data can help organizations understand what drives employees to take leave or unplanned absences. Unifying all absence and compensation programs within an organization can reduce overall cost, increase productivity and help determine the way employees use their company benefits.
A Strategy to Bind Them All
When you unite benefit programs as opposed to siloing them, your company can track important information, including:
- Lost time data
- Claim tracking
- Unaccounted for absences
- Overpayment of benefits
- Overpayment of salaries
You can also determine important information, like if your current benefits program makes employee choose between filing a worker’s compensation claim or filing for non-occupational disability benefits when they suffer a work-related injury.
If your organization is looking for ways to increase company productivity and reduce costs, you need to evaluate your absence management and absence reporting strategies. Contact the experts at Actec to learn how they can help you with accurate leave tracking and absence reporting solutions.