Published: Sep 9, 2026
How much do computer-work ailments cost a company?
At a board meeting, the question "how are our people feeling?" is rarely asked. Another one is asked: "how much is this costing us?". As an expert, I talk to dozens of companies, so I'll start with a number rather than sympathy. The costs of absenteeism in computer work don't just come down to sick leave days shown in the HR spreadsheet. The larger part of the bill is invisible and sits in the necks, backs, and wrists of people staring at a monitor eight hours a day. This article shows what it really costs, before we even get to the conversation about what to do about it.
Tomasz Świderski · 5 min read
Layer one: absenteeism, or the visible costs of computer work
Let's start with hard data from ZUS (Social Insurance Institution). In 2024, the Institution registered 27.4 million medical certificates for temporary incapacity for work, totaling 290.0 million days of sick leave absenteeism. The average sick leave for an employee's own illness lasted 11 days.
Now for a number that should give pause to anyone managing an office team. The most common cause of absenteeism in 2024 was diseases of the musculoskeletal system and connective tissue, accounting for 41.8 million days of sick leave absenteeism. That is more than respiratory infections and more than any other category on the ZUS list. In plain terms, backs, necks, and joints send Poles on sick leave more often than anything else. And these are precisely the ailments that build up at a desk.
What does this mean for your company in zlotys? The employer, not ZUS, pays for the first 33 days of absence in a year (Article 92 of the Labor Code). In 2022 alone, employers spent nearly 11 billion PLN on sick pay, with an average rate of 111.08 PLN per day. That is money paid for work that never happened. On top of that come replacement costs and a team making up for the absent employee.
Layer two: presenteeism, or what you can't see
This is where it gets interesting, because the biggest cost never makes it to the absenteeism spreadsheet. It's called workplace presenteeism: an employee is at their desk, but with neck pain or back tension, they work slower, focus worse, and make more mistakes. They didn't take sick leave. Productivity simply dropped, and no one measured it.
And this isn't a soft claim. A 2021 study in the Journal of Occupational Health provides a specific calculation from Japan: the cost of absenteeism is about $520 per person per year, while the cost of presenteeism is about $3,055. Six times more. A 2025 review in Cureus focusing on office workers in IT estimates the cost of presenteeism at roughly three times the cost of absenteeism and shows how widespread the problem is: in the surveyed sample, 53.6 percent of individuals met the criteria for chronic musculoskeletal pain.
Look at this from a board's perspective. If the cost of absence alone runs into the billions, and the cost of being present in pain is several times higher, the bill for ailments caused by computer work is far greater than what HR shows. The most expensive employee isn't the one on sick leave. It's the one who shows up and works at half capacity for months on end.
What can't I honestly quantify?
I'll be honest with you, because this article is for people who make decisions based on numbers. I won't give you a single flashy figure like "desk-related ailments cost Polish companies X billion a year." Such a figure, reliably calculated for office work in Poland, simply doesn't exist in any credible source, and making one up would insult your intelligence.
Instead, I have something better:
a few numbers that hold up. Musculoskeletal disorders are the number one cause of absenteeism in ZUS data. The employer pays for the beginning of the sick leave. Presenteeism is real and costs several times more than absence alone. That's enough to see that the problem is expensive.
What to do about it, no nonsense
Since the cost is real, it's tempting to throw in "some wellbeing program" and check off the box. A word of warning: simply launching a program guarantees nothing. A large study by Song and Baicker, published in JAMA in 2019, covered 160 workplaces and showed that offering a generic wellness program reduced neither absenteeism nor healthcare spending.
In short, it comes down to three conditions. First, target the real cost driver—the body at the desk—rather than a gadget that sidesteps the problem. Second, ensure adoption, because a benefit no one uses is a pure cost. Third, measure: days of absenteeism due to musculoskeletal conditions, reports of discomfort, turnover in the most strained teams.
If you're looking for a cheaper, tangible entry point, a good candidate is ergonomics.
FAQ
- How much does a day of employee absence cost?
The employer pays for the first 33 days of absence in a year (Article 92 of the Labor Code). The average daily rate of sick pay funded by employers was 111.08 PLN in 2022. On top of that, there are replacement costs and work that didn't happen, so the real cost of a day is higher than the benefit alone.
- How much does sick leave cost a company per year?
In 2022, employers in Poland spent nearly 11 billion PLN on sick pay alone, and that's only part of the bill, as it doesn't include presenteeism or replacement costs.
- What is workplace presenteeism?
This is a situation where an employee is present, but due to discomfort or ailments works with reduced productivity. Studies estimate the cost of presenteeism to be several times the cost of absenteeism, even though it doesn't appear in any absence report.
- Why are ailments from computer work so costly?
Because they combine two layers of cost: visible absenteeism, where musculoskeletal conditions are the number one cause in ZUS data, and invisible presenteeism, which typically costs more.
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