Attendance Policies

Rockie · February 2002

Can any of you suggest a fair and appropriate attendance policy for a medical practice. Take FMLA or disability out of the equation. I am talking about pure absences where employees call in at the last minute with unscheduled absences. This ranges from their own personal sickness or child care problems. While you can sympathize with employees who have issues with children up to a point, the bottom line is that there is a business to run and we need the people we hired to do the job to be on the job.

We need to put some teeth into our policy of unscheduled call offs where it is fair and consistent to everyone. We feel we have been overly generous in the past with allowing too many call-offs, but it is now at a point where something needs to be done.

If you have suggestions for a policy, please let me know.

Thanks!

Christine M · February 2002

For our non-exempt workforce, we offer PPT (Paid Personal Time) instead of sick time. This time can be used for any purpose and can be use in increments of one hour. Time off must be covered by PPT or Vacation time or it is counted as an occurrence in the Attendance policy. The amount of PPT should be set consistent to your industry, we offer 24 hours/yr which is not generous. We allow employees to accrue up to 150 hours PPT and unused PPT can be carried over from year to year. It is, however, not earned time but a benefit and is not paid out on termination. The hourly work force likes the flexibility and the ability to accrue "insurance" against a prolonged work outage. We feel any employee who has accrued large amounts of PPT has done so by providing good attendance over a prolonged period of time and so support these good employees' rights to use PPT as they wish, for example, many of our employees' families are in other countries and they may choose to use PPT to extend a vacation to visit family, or they may use PPT to cover a visit to the doctor's or a child's illness.

I would be interested in hearing the amount of sick time offered by others reading this posting, especially in a non-union manufacturing environment.

wire manufacturer · February 2002

Our attendance policy consists of a point system. We give an employee 1 piont if they call in their absence within 2 hours or 2 points if they call after that or don't call at all. If they are absent consecutive days with the same absence they only get 1 point if they call each day with the same illness. We also asses 1/3 of a point if they are late. The employees get warnings (oral/written/suspension)after 2, 4, 6, & 10 points. At 12 points they are terminated. After 1 year the point that you got for that day will drop off. We award employees that go 1 year without any points.
Keep in mind this is only for those employees that call in. They may arrange time off for a doctors appt, etc before the day without a point.
This seems to work pretty good for our manufacturing environment.
Hope this helps.

cebudragonlady · February 2002

Although there is no sick pay at our small non-union manufacturing facility, employees are pretty good about saving sick days to when they are really sick.
We try to be reasonable, and give cash gifts at the end year for going on overnight product installs - when on time attendance REALLY counts. The gift is usually $ 25 per day...we gave out $ 11,900 last Christmas, which was much appreciated by the workers.

Gar · February 2002

Based on my experience with a number of employers, I find that the best attendance policy is not to have a written policy. Sounds insain but it allows supervisors to exercise flexibility, and flexibility is good for business. The theory is that (all things being equal) a supervisor would want to treat a 20-year employee with a good record, who only recently experienced problems, more liberally than someone who has been with the firm only a year and is a chronic attendance problem.

I'm very aware of the consistentcy argumments to prevent discrimination against folks with legal protections (women, older workers and people of color, etc.). However, treating the 20-year employee differently is simply good business because he/she is a more valued asset due to the time and money invested in him/her. I've used that argument with the EEOC and it works.

Regardless of whether there is or isn't a policy, it falls to us HR folks to make sure that employees with attendance problems aren't treated differently because they are women, older, etc. We're the watch dogs and that's what we get paid to do.

Don D · March 2002

Whoooooaaaaaah! Can't believe the EEOC would buy the argument of treating tenured employees more favorably under the argument that 'they've earned it' and 'they're more valuable'. In our manufacturing company, with two plants in the same town and some 35 supervisors, I can't imagine depending on supervisors to enforce any sort of unwritten policy with 'consistency'. They would keep me tied up in hearings full time!

Johanaf · July 2002

I am with you 100%!!!!

Crout · July 2002

The fact that you've had to defend yourself against the EEOC at all would suggest that the policy of having no policy is ill-advised.

Down_the_Middle · February 2002

Rockie:
For whatever value this may offer, we have a no-fault attendance policy that addresses absenteeism/attendance and tardiness. As a health care facility, we take the position that while those things do occur, it's necessary to have staff report as scheduled---------the need to provide patient care outweighs the employees attendance or tardiness problems.

For absences such as sickness, sick child, etc......(last minute call-ins) employees get 4 absences per 12 month period. On the 5th absence we initiate progressive discipline and discharge if 7 absences occur within 12 months.

Tardiness is handled the same way ---with 8 tardy's initiating discip action and discharge occurs at 12. It's a no-fault program. 1 minute tardy is the same as 1 hr. The tardy employee does not have the right to disrupt the delivery of patient care. The employee who has completed their 12 hr shift wants to go home and cannot leave until the replacement arrives, so being tardy is a problem. This policy is rigid, but for valid reasons and certainly may not be desired by all employers. It works for us!

KarenR · July 2002

With a "No-Fault" Attendance Practice, I am assuming that allowable time such as FMLA leave is not included in this calculation, is that correct? Do you have union representation at your facility?

>Rockie:
>For whatever value this may offer, we have a no-fault attendance
>policy that addresses absenteeism/attendance and tardiness. As a
>health care facility, we take the position that while those things do
>occur, it's necessary to have staff report as scheduled---------the
>need to provide patient care outweighs the employees attendance or
>tardiness problems.
>
>For absences such as sickness, sick child, etc......(last minute
>call-ins) employees get 4 absences per 12 month period. On the 5th
>absence we initiate progressive discipline and discharge if 7 absences
>occur within 12 months.
>
>Tardiness is handled the same way ---with 8 tardy's initiating discip
>action and discharge occurs at 12. It's a no-fault program. 1
>minute tardy is the same as 1 hr. The tardy employee does not have
>the right to disrupt the delivery of patient care. The employee who
>has completed their 12 hr shift wants to go home and cannot leave
>until the replacement arrives, so being tardy is a problem. This
>policy is rigid, but for valid reasons and certainly may not be
>desired by all employers. It works for us!

Mutagawa · February 2002

Our company (hospital) also has an attendance policy that is based on a point system. Employees accumulate 1 point for any full (or consecutive)day unscheduled absence and 1/2 point for tardies or partial day unscheduled absences (for non-exempt employees only). Tardies can be counted at 1 minute past the employee's start time, but you may want to make it 5 minutes to allow some flexibility. The supervisors are responsible for tracking attendance on a rolling 12-month schedule. An unscheduled absence is defined as calling in and missing an entire work shift without prior approval. If the employee does not call in, it is considered a no call-no show and can be unpaid at the manager's discretion. Our policy also states that employees can be disciplined separately for failing to call in. Progressive discipline can be initiated when an employee accrues 2 points in one month or an absence pattern is identified. We have guidelines for managers on when to use verbal counseling, written counseling, etc. but they have some discretion based on an employee's previous attendance track record.

Nat · February 2002

We are a long-term care facility and implemented our Attendance Management Policy in September 2001. It has been very successful in that it has helped us get control back over our absenteeism problem. It is also a point system. I would be glad to send you a copy if you can get me your e-mail or fax number.

Nat

Rockie · February 2002

Nat: Please email at [email]hr@scheart.com[/email]

Thanks.

Elizabeth · February 2002

We recently implemented a point system attendance policy. This was a very large undertaking given that we are a city (a public employer) and therefore consist of a very diverse workforce (cops, EMT's, street workers, Parks & Recreation, etc.). We have five separate unions.

Our policy is similar to those mentioned above. We have 'substantiated' absences(usually a doctor's note) and 'unsubstantiated' absences. We have a very generous sick leave allotment in public employment (15 days per year). So, employees are allowed to take sick days according to the policy manual, but if they have something like a headache or flu and do not go to the doctor, it is considered 'unsubstantiated' and will incur one point per occurrence (occurrence may be consecutive days).

When they reach five points, they are given a Verbal Warning; at six, a Written Reprimand, at seven, an unpaid suspension day; at eight, three unpaid suspension days; at nine, they may be terminated. We also remove points after one year AND we also remove the last point accrued if an employee has PERFECT (no tardies, nothing) for 90 calendar days.

We just recently started this policy, so we'll see how it goes. Of course after all the negotiations, it is pretty watered-down, but at least we're all in agreement.

Rockie · February 2002

I guess another question would be on this subject: How do you handle your exempt level people who don't have "tardies" as they all come in and leave at different times? Our clinical people have to be here at 8AM or 8:30AM depending on the area they work in. Some of them are also exempt. Do you use the same "point system" for these individuals?

System · February 2002

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 02-27-02 AT 01:00PM (CST)[/font][p]It sounds like some supervisors need a backbone transplant. Whatever your policy is, every department will have at least one lazy employee who plays the system like a violin. Everyone else in the department knows who these people are, except perhaps the supervisor. Enforcing attendance can be very tough personally, and some supervisors aren't willing or able to do it.

There's a sample policy in the policy section of this forum:
[url]http://www.hrhero.com/policies/policyindex.shtml[/url]

James Sokolowski
Senior Editor
M. Lee Smith Publishers

jmssr · August 2002

We implemented an eight occurrence no fault policy. This policy has been in effect for several years, and has not caused us to lose any of our good attendance employees. Some employees will complain (usually the attendance problems). We can talk more if you are interested.

Attendance Policies

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