Member Article

Friday feeling costs firms £50m

British businesses are losing more than £50m a year because of employees skipping off work on Friday afternoons. A growing number of staff are treating the last day of the working week as an unofficial holiday, personnel software company Employersafe claims.

It found the top excuses for starting the weekend early are a long lunch, doctor’s appointment and an out-of-office meeting near to home. Employersafe also said the “Friday Feeling” trend has been reinforced by motoring organisations who report that the Friday rush hour now starts at about noon.

Pam Rogerson, head of personnel at Employersafe, said: “Our evidence suggests that more and more workers are seeing Friday afternoon as an unofficial holiday. We have estimated that this is costing British business just over £50m a year, which all goes to form part of the overall £13bn cost of workplace absenteeism.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .