Monthly payments of $200 promised to 'exemplary' airport screeners, but are they effective?
“You're exacerbating the situation, so you have more people calling in sick, more people claiming disability.”
So says Catherine Cosgrove, director of communications and public affairs at Teamsters Canada, in response to an attendance bonus program being rolled out for airport screeners.
Looking to combat long lines and flight delays at airports across Canada, the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority (CATSA) is offering such payments to three screening contractors to give to their staff. The $200-a-week bonus will be given out for “exemplary attendance” over the summer — meaning workers must show up for work on time and not take any sick days, lieu time or vacation days.
And if they have four consecutive weeks in a row for all of those checkpoints, then they get a $500 bonus on top of that, says Cosgrove, who has concerns about the new program.
“The bonus was put forward in the context of trying to deal with delays in airports screening right now, which has come about due to insufficient labour, an insufficient number of workers available to fill the roles, and increased pressure in airports.”
Wellbeing concerns
There are a few problems with the attendance bonuses, says Cosgrove. For one, employees have to wait 90 to see if they’re admissible and meet all the requirements.
“It would have been better had they consulted with the union to… come up with an incentive that made sense for workers and the employer and created better working conditions overall.”
In addition, union members with more seniority are able choose their own vacation days. But now, many are being told to give up their summer vacation for extra money, she says.
“It's not conducive, especially in a context where we see this situation… ongoing until the end of the year.”
If, on the other hand, it was a shorter timeline and more defined, this “would make more sense,” says Cosgrove.
“But if you're looking at an endemic situation where there is going to be a chronic shortage of workers, then… giving them bonuses to not take the time that they need to rest and recharge makes the situation worse.”
People are also being asked to not take breaks and to do mandatory overtime, she says.
“[When] you've had to work 13 hours straight, there's a high possibility that you maybe experience fatigue and that you may experience a workplace injury and, in a longer case situation, you may find that there's an impact on your mental health.”
Not necessarily the desired results
There are studies arguing that this type of presenteeism is actually much more costly for organizations than absenteeism, says Timo Vogelsang, assistant professor from the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management.
“People are coming to work although they are sick — this is the real problem, because then they may infect the other employees, they also are not getting well very quickly, maybe getting even more severe issues. ... So that's indeed a problem where you have to think about how high the incentive should be.”
Vogelsang and colleagues from the University of Cologne released a study on the topic in April 2022.
It involved 346 apprentices at 232 stores with a large retain chain in Germany who were either given no bonus or monthly bonus points if they had no absences for the whole month. The points were converted into rewards at the end of the year-long experiment: either 60 euros (monetary bonus) for a maximum of 240 euros or an additional vacation day (time-off bonus) for every three bonus points, up to four days per year.
The result? The monetary bonus substantially increased absenteeism, by an average of 45 per cent or the equivalent of more than five additional days absence per year, per employee.
The time-off bonus had no effect at all.
The big problem is the monetary bonuses led to absenteeism being perceived as a more acceptable behaviour, because they were provided for a practice already considered normal, says Vogelsang.
"Apprentices with the money bonus felt less guilty about being absent, despite not being sick, and also felt less obliged by their contract to always come to work.”
“This is something that can create some confusion with the employees in that they think… ‘This isn't something I should be rewarded for, it's in my contract. So, why should there be additional reward to come to work regularly?’” he says.
“I'm not saying, in general, this is a bad idea; I'm just saying you should be a little bit cautious.”
The results are reminiscent of a previous study done in Israel, where parents were fined if they were late picking their child up from school. As a result, parents started arriving even later because they figured if they paid extra money, they could pick their child up later, says Vogelsang.
When an employer brings in an attendance bonus, staff may start asking: “Why is this program being rolled out? Is there an attendance problem?” And then they may realize coworkers miss work often, and decide to do that themselves, he says.
Having supervisors more involved in the conversations with employees about potential problems, and then figuring out what the workers really need to come to work more regularly, would help, says Vogelsang.
“I strongly believe that it's also a management issue; it’s not necessarily an incentive issue…: How is your supervisor affecting the culture of the team, the atmosphere of the team? And I think many of the issues why employees do not come to work are actually the work atmosphere. And I think focusing more on the supervisors might be a helpful idea to address attendance problems.”
Amid the ongoing labour shortage, employers should pay more attention to the kinds of benefits they provide workers, judging by the results of a RBC survey.
