What is absence management support?
Absence management is ongoing clinical support to help employees who are off sick return to work safely, and to reduce how often and how long absence happens.
It supports an ongoing relationship with your HR team to keep more of your people in work and bring others back sooner.
You receive clinical guidance; the decisions on duties, adjustments or any process remain with you.
Meet the clinical team →How the support works
Structured and clinical, built around a safe, sustainable return to work.
Refer early
As soon as an absence looks like it may be prolonged or recurrent, refer. Early referral is almost always better at preventing long-term sickness absence.
Clinical assessment
Our clinician assesses the employee's health, the barriers to work and the likely prognosis, by video, phone or in person.
Advice you can act on
A plain-language report on fitness, likely timescales and any adjustments, including whether the Equality Act 2010 is likely to apply.
Reports within 72 hours of the appointmentReturn-to-work plan
Practical, time-bound steps: a phased return, adjusted duties and the support agreed with the employee.
Manager and HR support
Guidance on next steps and on the conversation with the employee.
Review and reduce
We stay involved through complex or long-term cases and report what is driving absence.
Reducing absence across your organisation
Alongside individual cases, we help you tackle the causes and the hardest cases at an organisational level.
Complex case management
We convene case conferences with HR, the manager, the employee and our clinician to agree a way forward on entrenched absence.
Ill-health retirement
Where a return to work is not achievable, our OH physician provides clear, impartial assessment against your pension scheme's criteria, including Teachers' Pensions and the LGPS.
Referral-pathway design
We work with HR to design when and how absence triggers a referral, so problems are caught earlier and handled consistently and fairly across the organisation.
Absence analytics
Anonymised, aggregate insight into the patterns and causes driving your absence – by team, condition and time of year.
What is sickness absence really costing you?
Employers recorded an average of 9.4 sick days per employee in 2025, up from 7.8 in 2023 (CIPD). Use the calculator to estimate your organisation's annual cost, see how it splits across mental health, musculoskeletal and other causes, and model the saving from reducing it. Every figure is sourced.
Where the cost sits
Model a reduction
1.0 daysHow this is calculated, and what's included
Absence management FAQs
Answers to the questions HR and managers ask most.
No. It is supportive and clinical. The aim is to understand what is keeping someone off work and to help them back safely, not to penalise illness.
As early as the absence looks likely to be prolonged or recurrent. Early referral gives the most options and the best outcomes, especially for stress and mental-health absence.
Yes. Medical detail stays between the employee and our clinicians. Your report focuses on fitness for work, timescales and adjustments, not diagnosis.
The report gives you clinical advice on fitness, prognosis and adjustments. Any decision rests with you, taking that advice into account alongside your own process.
A phased return to work is a planned, temporary reduction in hours or duties so that an employee can come back before they are fully recovered. Occupational health advises on the pattern and the review points; the employer agrees it with the employee.
It is commonly taken as four weeks or more, but the right time to involve us is guided by the situation, not just the calendar.
We typically offer an appointment within 5 working days and provide the written report within 72 hours of the appointment.
Related services
Absence management often works alongside these:
Management referrals
Independent, work-focused advice on fitness, adjustments and return to work.
Learn more →Mental health & neurodiversity
Support for mental ill health, the leading cause of long-term absence (CIPD 2025).
Learn more →Wellness screening
Screening days that pick up the conditions behind absence.
Learn more →This page is general information for employers and is not individual medical or legal advice.
Talk to us about absence management
Talk to our team about proactive absence management for your organisation. We answer enquiries within 3 working hours and turn reports around within 72 hours.