11 Oct 2023 at 00:02
Not all employees who lose a loved one are equally satisfied with the support from their employer. People who had to use their vacation days during the mourning period in particular lacked support from their boss.
The Netherlands does not have legally established bereavement leave, like other European countries such as Belgium. It varies per collective labor agreement and employer which scheme employees can use if they lose a loved one.
And that leads to different experiences among grieving employees, according to the National Working Conditions Survey (NEA) by statistics bureau CBS and TNO. People who had to use their own vacation days or ADV days after a death are particularly dissatisfied with the support from their employer.
“30 percent of them think that their employer could have done more,” says CBS researcher Luuk Hovius. For example, the employer could have asked how things were going and been less insistent about returning to work, respondents say. They would also have liked more free time, without this being at the expense of their leave balance.
Of employees who could take another type of paid leave, only 12 percent were dissatisfied with their employer.
Parents who lose a child often stay away for a long time
The research also shows that people who have lost a child are most likely to be absent from work for more than a week. Yet almost a quarter of them return to work within a week. “People have different styles in dealing with loss,” says Hovius.
Of the employees who have lost their partner, more than a third return to work fully within a week. People who have lost someone other than a child, partner or parent return to the workplace more quickly. Only 13 percent of them remain absent for more than a week.
By 2022, 6 percent of all employees had lost someone in the past two years. 4 percent of employees lost a parent, child or partner.
2023-10-10 22:02:13
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