Employees may want to re-think about taking unnecessary sick leave as employers in the UK are turning to a new voice analysis system.

One of the systems, developed by Digilog, listens to the caller’s voice when they phone in sick and detects changes that suggest they are lying or under pressure, alerting the person taking the call.

It is estimated that nearly one in eight sick days are not legitimate, costing the UK economy STG13 billion ($A27 billion) each year.

Britain’s Daily Mail said that in a trial in North-West London, saved the Borough of Harrow approximately STG420,000 ($A871,000) in false benefit claims.

An Australian Bureau of Statistics survey in 2003 has reported that the rate of absenteeism among Australian workers shows a marked difference between the private and public sector.

In a two-week period, 9.5 per cent of public sector workers were absent from work due to either sickness or injuries, compared with 6.1 per cent of private sector workers.