How do you recognise addiction in the workplace? What is the business and human cost of ignoring it? And what should an employer do to address this vital issue? The human cost of alcoholism and drug dependence is well documented: dependent personalities, emotionally deprived or abusive relationships, blighted childhoods, broken marriages, unfulfilled potential and wasted lives.

But the business cost is considerable too, with fatalities, accidents, absenteeism, reduced productivity, impaired relationships, lost sales, missed deadlines and customer dissatisfaction and complaints often attributable to alcohol misuse.

A US study showed that 40 per cent of industrial fatalities and 47 per cent of industrial injuries were due to alcohol. A British study showed that people who drink more than 21 units of alcohol a week have twice as much sick leave as others.

Sources at IBEC told Health Matters that hard facts and figures on the business cost of alcohol misuse are "glaringly missing and difficult to quantify" because the problem is often concealed by the alcoholic or covered up by family and colleagues.

Mr James McCabe, a counsellor and employee assistant programme (EAP) consultant based in Dublin, says addiction tends to show up last in the workplace.

Family, house and friends may "be gone" but the addict could still be coming to work. The "workplace is the source of money, power and self-esteem. It is usually the last one to go", he says.

But if the addiction doesn't show up in the workplace, "it's probably none of the employer's business", unless the addict asks for help. "We wouldn't want anyone to be going on a witchhunt," he says.

However, employers often tend to unwittingly enable unacceptable behaviour to continue. If a person's work performance or behaviour towards colleagues or customers deteriorates, the employer ought not to ignore the problem. "If it's an addiction, it can only get progressively worse," he says.

"There's a way of taking non-judgmental intervention to try to get them to take responsibility for themselves," he says. If the employer does nothing until the employee has to be sacked, the workplace loses the potential that this person had, as well as the human tragedy for the addict and his family.

Moreover, addicts in recovery often do better than before, so there's a sound economic argument for the employer to facilitate the addict's recovery, he says. Mr Rolande Anderson of the Rutland Centre in Dublin, a residential treatment centre for addicts, believes employers need to have an addiction policy in place which is "worked out, negotiated and talked through carefully".

Employers should never diagnose alcohol dependence but rather focus on documented work evidence. "You don't go on rumour or innuendo. You go on the fact that the person has unexplained leave etc. Review the person as you would do in any good managerial practice and say `Look, there are issues here for you. I'm not sure what they are. But you may need help with this and I'd like you to see our occupational health nurse and get back to me.' Then it's reviewed again," he says.

If you have a policy in place, employees' drink problems could be addressed earlier. Because addiction shows up first at home and last at work, "the idea is to try to help [employers] to spot the signs earlier so people get help at an earlier stage", he says.

The traditional solutions were transfer, ignore or sack. "We're saying you need to be much more pro-active in helping people" and a pro-active approach "makes good economic and moral sense", he says.

Mr Anderson says the workplace signs and symptoms of addiction to alcohol can include:

absenteeism on Mondays, Fridays or the day after payday;

frequent unexcused absences;

a lower pace of work in the morning due to a hangover or following a drinking lunch in the afternoon;

regular mistakes and errors of judgment;

borrowing money from employees;

arrests for drunken driving;

an uneven work pace - one week good, one week bad;

avoiding work involving stress, conflict, co-ordination, precision or close visual attention;

neglecting details formerly attended to;

accidents and breakages on and off the job;

unusual lapses in memory;

sleeping or dozing on the job;

wide mood changes;

isolation from colleagues;

aggressive behaviour and paranoia;

a flushed face, the fresh odour of alcohol and regular use of breath fresheners;

slurred speech;

and deteriorating personal appearance.

The Rutland Centre is running a one-day seminar on Addiction in the Workplace at the Doyle Green Isle Hotel in Dublin next Monday, November 16th. Cost: £120. For details, ring 01 494 6358.