Sick Day Excuses You Used For School Work Perfectly Well For Work, Finds Study

A RECENT study has found that a large number of adults wishing to bunk off work by ringing in sick are putting too much effort into their excuses, adding that the same hackneyed routines that kids use to get a day off school work just as good.

The study coincides with figure revealed in yesterdays Small Firms Association Absenteeism Report for 2014, which stated that 4,052,222 days were lost to absenteeism last year at a cost of €490 million to small businesses.

Back pain, migraines and “a bug or something” were the biggest contributors to absent employees, with most business managers reporting that their employees had rang in and gone into great detail as to how they had fallen ill. The new report published yesterday states that such elaborate reasoning is not necessary, and the tried and true method of sniffling a bit on the phone still works perfectly fine.

“A lot of people make the classic mistake of over-thinking things when ringing in sick, ” said George Smith, head of the Sick Day study. “You must remember that the more elaborate your excuse is, the quicker it can fall apart.”

“If you ring your boss to say you won’t be in because you’re sick, keep it short and sweet.” he added. “The old methods such as holding your nose, talking while holding a small amount of liquid in your mouth, or lying down on a plug will all be as convincing as a huge, multi-layered story about how you think you may have malaria”.

The news comes as a relief to people across the country who need a day off work to go to a wedding or something, but don’t want it eating into their annual leave.