I'm interested in your perspective as an employer . My view is that sickies should be for when you are genuinely sick . Unfortunately , it is built in to the Aussie culture to take them for other reasons . In the US , they call them a personal day . I assume personal days are accrued differently but I'm not sure . Maybe we should have them here as an option ?
Anyway , the perception amongst employees is that sickies are budgeted for so therefore it is an expected business cost . That's how some people justify taking a sickie when they are not sick . On that basis , should those that never take sickies be given the money when they leave as a kind of a reward ?
I worked at a place once where if you had been there for more than 10 years , your sickies accrued and you got paid out when you left .
It was amazing how people stopped getting sick after 10 years .
