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For the organisation

Sickness absence cost calculator

Absence costs about three times what your accounts show. Direct salary is the only part with its own line item; cover, presenteeism and the management time spent absorbing it are real money that lands somewhere else. Move the three inputs and the gap below is yours.

£55,000
100
2.5%

Assumes 260 working days. Cover at 70% of direct cost, presenteeism at 50%, management time at 15%, which are mid-range against published UK figures. Your own numbers will differ, which is rather the point of an assessment.

Total annual cost

£0

What it looks like, against what it is
Two bars on one scale comparing the direct salary cost with the total cost. Exact figures are in the table below.
In your accounts, as salary £0
What it actually costs £0
Where it goes
Working days lost 0
Direct salary £0
Cover £0
Presenteeism £0
Management time £0
Total £0

Presenteeism is the largest line in that table and the one no organisation measures. Why presenteeism costs more than absence sets out where that multiplier comes from, and why the people still at their desks are the expensive part.

Send yourself the figures.

I will email this breakdown with the assumptions written out, so you can put it in front of a finance director without having to defend a number you cannot source.

A number is not a case. It is the start of one.

A resilience assessment replaces these assumptions with your actual figures, and says which of them you can move.

What an assessment involves

Questions people ask before they call

How do you calculate the cost of sickness absence?
Start with salary for the days lost, then add the three costs that never appear as a line item: cover, whether that is agency, overtime or a colleague absorbing it; management time spent rearranging work; and presenteeism, the reduced output of people who came in unwell. Direct salary is roughly a third of the real figure.
What is the average number of sick days per employee in the UK?
The Health and Safety Executive recorded 22.1 million working days lost to work-related stress, depression or anxiety alone in 2024/25, at an average of 22.9 days per affected case. That counts only work-related ill health and only the people who stopped turning up, so it is a floor rather than a total.
Why is absence more expensive than the salary paid?
Because the salary is the only part that stops. The work does not: it is covered, deferred or done badly, and each of those costs money somewhere else in the organisation. Cover is paid twice, deferred work arrives late, and the colleagues absorbing it are the ones most likely to leave next.
Does this include presenteeism?
Yes, and it is usually the largest component. Deloitte put the annual cost of poor mental health to UK employers at 51 billion pounds and identified presenteeism as the single largest contributor at around 24 billion, more than absence itself. A calculator that counts only days off understates the problem by design.
Is a low absence rate a good sign?
Not necessarily. Where taking sick leave is difficult, through attendance targets or a culture in which nobody senior is ever off, absence figures fall and presenteeism rises. The work gets done worse, by people who are unwell, and the reporting improves. An unusually low rate in a demanding organisation is worth investigating.