Pictured: Senior HR advisor David Colley gets employees in line, from left - David Wong, Steve Jeffry and David Colley

A Notts business says it will save over £42,000 this winter by offering its employees flu jabs free of charge.

Domestic and General, which is based in Talbot Street in the city centre, has teamed up with an external provider to offer 156 vaccinations to its employees, which will protect against the three most common strains of flu as well as swine flu. 

Research from the HR team at the call centre showed that between 1 September 2010 and 31 March 2011 a total of 400 employees were absent due to cold and flu related illnesses. This represented 5,292 lost working hours and accounted for 15.79% of all absences, with flu being the number one reason given by employees.  

Between the 30 November and 1 December, a nurse will be visiting the call centre to administer the jabs, which have been allocated on a first come, first serve basis to employees who have not been eligible for jabs for free from their GPs. The jabs cost £9.25 each for Domestic & General and the HR team have been advertising the scheme internally via e-shots, through line managers in each department and on posters in the staff break out areas.

David Colley, senior HR advisor at Domestic & General says: "This is the first time we have run an initiative like this, but after a speculative email from a vaccine provider, we decided to do some research to see if there could potentially be any demand for jabs through work. We found that last year, 15% of all reported sickness absence to the call centre was as a result of colds and flu. 

We had to put together a financial case using this information, to show how beneficial a vaccination programme would be to the business. We looked at how much money we could potentially save in the long run, and also conducted a staff survey to find out if employees would be interested. We had 125 responses really quickly, so this determined that we needed to schedule in two full days for a nurse to come in."

David continues: "From the research we were able to see that if we were paying all those employees during their absence, it would have cost Domestic & General nearly £42,000, and that doesn't include the loss of productivity either. We have to consider the time where we haven't been able to respond to call volumes and also lost sales opportunities.

"The take-up has been great, and we only have 14 vaccines left, which we anticipate being snapped up pretty soon. We've also purchased 25 separate vouchers which will allow employees to go and get their jabs from a local Tesco pharmacy. We are keeping these to one side, primarily for people who work night shifts, and may not be in work when the nurse is there during the day. We 're confident that we can really tackle winter bugs head on this year!"

Domestic & General is well known for tackling sickness by helping to promote wellbeing amongst its 800 employees. Since 2008, the contact centre has been running a Wellness Wednesday initiative, which has included activities such as a Weight Watchers visit, occupational therapy, Zumba classes and Nintendo Wii Fit Sessions, all free of charge to employees.

Since its creation, the wellness initiative has had a striking impact on time lost to illness. When it launched, the company had 5.81% of annual sickness absence, dropping to its lowest ever, 2.89%, this autumn. This is well below the organisation's target of 3.5%. And the organisers say the take-up rate for classes among the workforce has been fantastic, with most sessions booked out.

Since Wellness Wednesdays launched, Domestic & General has also found employee engagement levels are up, with more staff than ever choosing to stay on at the firm.