Absenteeism in Business: The E.ON UK Story

Absenteeism is one of those HR topics that often slips under the radar in Business lessons. But for real organisations, it has a huge impact on productivity, costs, morale, and the customer experience. A great example of this is E.ON UK, one of the country’s major energy suppliers, which faced a rise in staff absence and decided to tackle it strategically.

What is absenteeism?

Absenteeism measures the percentage of employees who are not at work (when scheduled) over a given period.

To calculate the labour turnover of a business, you can use the following formula:

Number of staff absent / Total number of staff employed X 100

For example, If 10 employees of a 100-staff workforce are absent on a given day, the calculation would be:

10 ÷ 100 × 100 = 10%

But you need to think of absenteeism as more than just a formula. This video gives you the bigger picture before we step into the E.ON story.

The issue facing E.ON UK

E.ON employs thousands of staff across power stations, customer-service centres, engineering teams and corporate offices. Many operational roles involve:

• shift work

• demanding physical environments

• changing additional tasks depending on what the business needs

The combination of tough working conditions and unpredictable workloads meant that absenteeism gradually began to rise. As absences increased, the business noticed various knock-on effects:

• higher reliance on overtime

• increased pressure on remaining staff

• slower response times for customers

• rising long-term sickness cases

Instead of simply managing absence on a case-by-case basis, E.ON decided it needed a

more joined-up approach.

What E.ON UK did

To get on top of the problem, E.ON introduced a refreshed health and wellbeing strategy. Their approach centred around three main actions:

1. Earlier support for staff

Managers were trained to identify concerns sooner, have structured conversations with staff returning from absence, and offer appropriate support. This helped prevent short-term absences from developing into long-term problems.

2. Health and wellbeing initiatives

E.ON launched workplace health campaigns, on-site wellbeing events, and access to lifestyle support programmes. These encouraged staff to look after their health and reduced avoidable absence.

3. Better coordination between HR, health teams and operational managers

Instead of treating absenteeism as just an HR task, E.ON brought occupational-health teams closer to the day-to-day running of the business. This meant managers received faster advice and clearer guidance on how to support employees.

What were the results?

• Absence levels began to fall.

• Fewer long-term sickness cases emerged.

• Staff felt better supported and more engaged.

• Teams became more reliable and consistent, reducing delays and improving service.

Most importantly, absenteeism stopped being seen as a “numbers problem” and became part of improving workplace culture and performance.

Questions for business students to think about:

1. If 6 out of 120 staff are absent today, what is the absenteeism rate?

2. Why might absenteeism be higher in shift-based or physical roles than office-based roles?

3. What do you think will be the three biggest causes of absenteeism over the next ten years?