Whilst the cost of employee absence varies considerably between different organisations, the annual median cost of absence per employee is considerable. One CIPD study calculated it as £595 per year[1], whilst another study by the CBI put the figure as £760[2]. Either way, the savings to be had from any reduction in absence are substantial.
>Moreover, the CBI estimates that 15% of all absences are not genuine, costing businesses in the UK £2.7 billion a year. It is possible to reduce such absences in your company through implementing a good T&A system – several factors help achieve this, including increased employee accountability.
If you are going to invest the time and money to purchase , implement and run a T&A system, you want one which both maximises the savings and benefits you can achieve, and is going to last you a good many years.
You will end up making a substantial investment in such a system – not just the cost of the software and the readers (which you may minimise by choosing a pay-as-you-system), but also the training and expertise you develop in using the system and, most importantly, the historical data you build up.
If you need to change because you have outgrown a system, then you need to consider not just the cost of the new system itself but also the costs of learning to use it. Additionally, potential loss of data should be taken into account – if you cannot both export the data from your current system and import it into your new one, you must either waste valuable time doing this manually (at which point some errors will almost certainly creep in), or abandon that important source of useful data. Bear in mind also that there are legal obligations to keep clocking data for two years.
[1] Absence Management: Annual survey report 2013, (CIPD) p. 5.
[2] Healthy Returns? Absence and workplace health survey 2011, (CBI) p. 6.