Tardy Workers not Fooling the Boss

April 26, 2006 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - Thirteen percent of workers say they arrive late to work at least once a week and 24% say they do so at least once a month, according to a survey by CareerBuilder.com.

HR.BLR.com reports that the survey found that one-in-five workers make up fake excuses for being tardy. However, they are not always fooling the boss. Thirty-five percent of responding managers said they do not believe the tardy worker’s excuse most of the time.

According to HR.BLR.com, Rosemary Haefner, vice president of human resources for CareerBuilder.com said, “Thirty percent of hiring managers say they don’t care if their employees come in late as long as their work is completed on time with good quality. However, one-in-ten hiring managers say they would consider terminating an employee if he/she arrives late once or twice in a given year. One-in-five say a pink slip may be in order if an employee is late three times in a year.”

Primary causes for tardiness, cited by employees, were traffic (27%), falling back to sleep (11%), and getting kids ready for school or daycare (10%). Other reasons cited included forgetting something at home, feeling sick, and not being able to find the house or car keys.

In addition, the survey found that most tardies occur on Mondays, according to 64% of hiring managers surveyed.

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