Fifth of young accountants fake illness to avoid busy work periods

More than half (54%) of young accountants in the UK say they take time off work to intentionally avoid busy dates in the work calendar, such as tax and reporting deadlines, with 21% of workers citing illness, according to new research commissioned by AccountsIQ.

The research was conducted among 251 young finance professionals between the ages of 18 and 35 who have up to three years’ experience.

Of those who have intentionally avoided the busy days, 44% have admitted to doing so by calling in sick as opposed to booking annual leave. The issue of absenteeism is perhaps unsurprising, with 96% of young finance professionals claiming they get frustrated in their current roles.

Of these, 41% cite the reason being that expectations are too high and 39% are frustrated with the lack of recognition.

AccountsIQ added that a lack of time and resources appears “to be a resounding factor in their unhappiness”, with a third of young professionals surveyed (33%) saying they don’t have enough time to complete the tasks they are given, and almost as many (32%) claiming there is too much manual reporting in their work. On top of this, more than a quarter (27%) said they have been given an unrealistic workload.

Darren Cran, CCO at AccountsIQ, said: “Poor morale, frustrations with workload and lack of technological resource among younger professionals threaten to undermine the long-term vitality and performance of finance and accounting. We need to see closer attention to nurturing young finance professionals, who have a different set of attitudes and expectations of their employers than previous generations.

“These young accountants coming through the ranks are already tech-savvy and understand the power of automation and how it can be leveraged to improve their workstreams. It’s important for leaders to provide them with modern tools that remove the manual work they themselves had to endure, to keep them motivated and engaged.”