by Don C. Brunell
President, Association of
Washington Business

They say you can buy nearly anything on the Internet. These days, that includes phony doctors excuses so you can play hooky from work.
Internet vendors, such as phonyexcuses.com charge between $5 and $25 for realistic looking notes from a doctor or funeral home so workers can take the day off. Some Web sites carry warnings that purchasers assume the responsibility for using the fake documents, while others deadpan that the excuses are for entertainment purposes only.
Apparently, theres a market for such things. The Associated Press reports that almost one-third of the U.S. workforce called in sick last year. Now, instead of calling in with a husky voice to croak that youre under the weather, you can buy any number of documents to bolster your case. In fact, MyExcusedAbsence.com promises that its clients can get 40 hours of pay without the work.
While some might think this is funny sort of like, the dog ate my homework there are three problems with this scam. Its dishonest. It steals from employers and co-workers. And it can get you fired.
The dishonest part is self-evident, or at least it should be. Employees who want to take a day off to chill should take a vacation day rather than sick leave. In fact, to deter workers from abusing sick leave, many employers reimburse employees for some or all of their unused sick days.
Secondly, faking sick leave steals from employers and co-workers. The fakers co-workers have to take up the slack for their missing colleague and the employer pays for lost productivity or overtime. In fact, absenteeism costs U.S. companies nearly $74 billion each year, according to Mark Pauly, a professor of health care systems at the University of Pennsylvanias Wharton School. This figure includes spillover expenses, such as overtime and overstaffing, that companies incur to compensate for the absent workers.
The Wharton study found that absenteeism takes a heftier toll on knowledge-based industries, which are a big part of the Washington economy. Knowledge-based positions require more teamwork and foster interdependence, which explains why the absence of a colleague would have a more severe ripple effect.
Lastly, falsifying documents to take a sick day is much more serious than just faking a phone call. Some large companies now have specialists who track employee absences and check the authenticity of sick leave excuses. If they confirm that a written excuse is a fake, the employee can be fired.
Unfortunately, confirming a fake doctors note is not easy.
Under the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) enacted by Congress in 1996, employers cannot contact a doctor to determine if the doctors note is legitimate. The patient privacy provisions of the law ensure confidentiality so, in many cases, employers have no idea if the note is fake or real.
Congress should step in and clarify or amend HIPPA so employers can confirm the authenticity of medical excuses. But rules alone will not solve the problem.

What we really need is for parents to teach their children to be honest. They need to lead by example. What we need is a culture that values principles rather than expedience, hard work rather than selfishness and commitment rather than self-indulgent scams.