Sooner rather than later: Curing long-term absence

Shattering the debilitating impact long-term absence can have on business and its purse strings is a real challenge, and one that employers continue to struggle with. Annie Hayes asks the experts to share their secrets.

What is long-term absence?

Ben Willmott, employee relations adviser at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) says that the professional body generally agrees that long-term absence constitutes a continuous period of absence for four working weeks or one calendar month, but the definition is not always as clear cut. At energy powerhouse Centrica, the time-line is a little shorter.

Martyn Davidson, head of occupational health for the firm, says that a period of absence for 21 days or more falls into the realms of 'long-term absence' but adds there is "no general agreement" on when sickness falls into the category of long-term.

What we do know is that long-term absence is only a small portion of the wider absence statistic.