Nearly a quarter (23%) of small to medium sized businesses' owners and managers in the UK are plagued by suspicious employee sick leave, according to new research from Bibby Financial Services.

It found other difficult and awkward HR issues that management have to deal with include employee tardiness (20%), staff complaining about colleagues (20%), pay disputes (18%) and even having to intervene when it comes to poor personal hygiene of staff (10%).

With such a varied list of day to day HR issues to deal with, the research found that owners and managers are struggling to keep up with legislative changes (33%), deal with difficult members of staff (13%) and find the time to deal with HR issues properly (11%).

David Robertson, chief executive, Bibby Financial Services, says: “Dealing with staff absence is a delicate process for employers and must be done ‘by the book’, which takes a lot of time and consideration. What’s clear from our research is that with so many things going on in a business environment, owners and managers simply don’t have the time to handle everything themselves and important long-term HR issues get left aside for the short-term, quick-fixes.”