Unplanned absence costs more than the empty chair: someone covers, a supervisor scrambles, and the work slows. This calculator prices the pattern at loaded labor cost, then checks whether the pattern itself is a compliance signal.
This tool produces planning estimates from your inputs. It is not legal advice; absence patterns that may involve FMLA, ADA, or workers' compensation need individualized review before any discipline.
Each absence day is priced at 8 hours of loaded labor cost (wage times a burden multiplier), then multiplied by a coverage factor: 1.0 when work simply waits, up to 1.75 for temp coverage, because covered absence costs the absent wage plus the coverage premium plus coordination time.
The dollar figure is only half the diagnostic. Absence concentrated in a few people around predictable days is an enforcement problem. Absence that may be medical-related is potentially an FMLA, ADA, or workers' comp matter, and disciplining it like an attendance problem is how employers convert a cost into a claim.
An attendance policy applied through informal supervisor exceptions creates comparator evidence: the employee who was disciplined will point to the one who was not. Inconsistent enforcement is a bigger legal risk than a generous policy.
Most benchmarks put unplanned absence around 3 to 6 days per employee per year. Above that, look for concentration: it is almost never everyone, and the concentration tells you whether the cause is engagement, supervision, or something protected.
Not before checking whether FMLA, ADA accommodation, or workers' comp applies. An absence that qualifies for protection cannot be counted like an ordinary occurrence, and terminating over protected absence is one of the most reliably expensive HR mistakes.
It helps with consistency, but a no-fault points system that counts protected absences is itself a compliance problem. The policy needs a carve-out and a review step before points convert into discipline.
Fix the top drivers: unpredictable scheduling, supervisor friction, and burnout from covering other absences. Absence is contagious in overloaded teams; reducing the load reduces the absence.
Book a no-cost 30-minute consult. Bring your result, and leave with a straight read on the risk and a practical next step.