Bradford Factor

Details on Bradford Factor, including, how to view the report, and how calculations are affected by your time off policy settings.

Oliver Cook avatar
Written by Oliver Cook
Updated over a week ago

The Bradford Factor report in Sage HR is available to help you manage and analyse your employees' absences.


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What is the Bradford Factor?

The Bradford Factor is a simple formula that allows companies to apply a relative weighting to employee unplanned absences, such as medical appointments, emergency childcare etc.

📎NOTE: It is also known as the Bradford Formula, the Bradford Score, and the Bradford Index,

The Bradford factor works out the negative effect of sick leave taken by employees. Your employee Bradford Factor score is based on absence days during the last 52 weeks.

The calculation of the Bradford Factor is S² x D = B

  • S is the total number of separate absences by an individual.

  • D is the total number of days of absence of that individual.

  • B is the Bradford Factor score.


How to view the Bradford Factor report

  1. On the main menu click Reports.

  2. Click Time off, then click Bradford factor.

You can choose what time off policies you want to see on this report. Click Filter, select the policies then click Save.

The report shows how many Occasions the employee has been off, the total number of days, and their Bradford factor score. You also see a bar chart as a visual.


How your time off policy settings affect your Bradford Factor report figures

The Bradford Scale calculator takes into account just the days an employee is due to be working. So, it will only include weekends and public holidays if the staff member in question has been scheduled to work on those days and is absent.

This means that the Count weekends as workdays and Count public holidays as workdays options in your time off policy settings affect your Bradford Factor calculation depending on what you have or don't have selected.

So, if a certain policy has selected Count weekends as workdays, then those weekend days will be included in the Bradford Factor. The same applies if you select Count public holidays as workdays.

Below is an example of someone's time off, followed by scenarios of how your Bradford Factor would be affected depending on which settings you have enabled or disabled

EXAMPLE:

  • You have one request for 7 days in a row, Monday to Sunday.

  • Saturday and Sunday are considered weekend days.

  • The Monday in those 7 days is a public holiday.


Scenario 1

In your time off policy settings:

  • 'Count weekends as working days' is disabled

  • 'Count Public Holidays as Working days' is disabled

Below is what figures would show in your Bradford factor report.

  • Occasions - 1

  • Total days - 4

  • Bradford Factor score - 4

📎NOTE: 3 days aren't included in the report - The public holiday and the two weekend days.


Scenario 2

In your time off policy settings:

  • 'Count weekends as working days' is enabled

  • 'Count public holidays as Working days' is enabled

Below is what figures would show in your Bradford factor report.

  • Occasions - 1

  • Total days - 7

  • Bradford Factor score - 7

📎NOTE: The whole week is included in the report.


Scenario 3

In your time off policy settings:

  • 'Count weekends as working days' is disabled

  • 'Count public holidays as workdays' is enabled

Below is what figures would show in your Bradford factor report.

  • Occasions - 1

  • Total days - 5

  • Bradford Factor score - 5

📎NOTE: 2 days, the weekend days, are not included in the report.


Scenario 4

In your time off policy settings:

  • 'Count weekends as working days' is enabled

  • 'Count public holidays as workdays' is disabled

Below is what figures would show in your Bradford factor report.

  • Occasions - 1

  • Total days - 6

  • Bradford Factor score - 6

📎NOTE: Only 1 day, the public holiday, is not included in the report.

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