The current economic crisis demands that all large companies review their costs and find ways to cut them as much as possible. One of the areas being targeted by large corporations today is absenteeism. JC Penney is working diligently with their employees in an effort to cut employee absences and the expenses they entail.

Hundreds of our country’s largest employers have estimated that unscheduled absences cost them over $750,000 a year in payroll. Costs are much greater, however, when you take into account lost revenue and lower productivity. Excessive absenteeism also results in lower employee morale, which eventually also affects the bottom line.

JC Penney is trying to resolve their absenteeism problem through a new program they’ve set up. The program is called Power Line and is made up of a team of employees. Any employee who will be out of work for three or more days will contact the Power Line group and the group will determine the type of benefit the employee is entitled to. If forms are necessary, these will be provided to the employee. The team then notifies the employee’s store directly. The Power Line employee follows-up with the absent employee and continues to do so until this person returns to work. Although this new system has only been in use for the past 90 days, the store believes that they are already seeing positive results.

This is just one of the many areas being investigated today to determine how else corporate expenses can be lowered. If major companies want to survive in these troubling times, they will have to make every effort to cut costs while still providing exceptional customer service.