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Think an employee is faking sick? Check social media.

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It’s that time of year again. Open enrollment, flu shots, and CareerBuilder.com’s list of the most creative excuses for missing work.

But before I get to that, how about some missed-work statistics based on responses from 2,203 hiring managers and human resource professionals, and 3,103 U.S. workers (employed full-time, not self-employed, non-government).

  • 28% of employees have called in to work sick when they were feeling well
  • 59% of those fakers either didn’t feel like going to work or just wanted to relax
  • 24% of employer have caught some one faking sick by using social media
  • 22% of those fakers sleuthed out on social were fired

I, for one, narrowly escaped termination when confronted with the Instagram shots of my navel piercing at the mall kiosk. If you attend my event with top officials from the EEOC and NLRB next month in Philly (details here), maybe I’ll show it to you.

(That sound year hear is part vomit, and part clamor for refunds on the free tickets would-be attendees are now returning, thanks to me).

Maybe, I better make with the Career Builder Top 10 excuses for missing work:

  1. Employee just put a casserole in the oven.
  2. Employee’s plastic surgery for enhancement purposes needed some “tweaking” to get it just right.
  3. Employee was sitting in the bathroom and her feet and legs fell asleep. When she stood, up she fell and broke her ankle.
  4. Employee had been at the casino all weekend and still had money left to play with on Monday morning.
  5. Employee woke up in a good mood and didn’t want to ruin it.
  6. Employee had a “lucky night” and didn’t know where he was.
  7. Employee got stuck in the blood pressure machine at the grocery store and couldn’t get out.
  8. Employee had a gall stone they wanted to heal holistically.
  9. Employee caught their uniform on fire by putting it in the microwave to dry.
  10. Employee accidentally got on a plane.

As always when I post this list, I love to hear back from you about the most cray-cray excuses your employees have offered for missing work.

(And no, binge-reading https://www.theemployerhandbook.com is not crazy. Promote that person immediately).