More than two-thirds of staff working in the leisure sector have confessed to pulling a sickie, ranking them second in a national leaderboard of those most likely to lie to get extra days off.

A report, published to mark "National Sickie Day" today (3 February), surveyed 2,160 employees to determine "who lies most frequently" – as well as the most common excuses used to gain extra days off work.

It shows that people within the leisure, sport and tourism sector were found to be the second most likely to pull a sickie, with 68 per cent of sector employees admit to faking an illness to avoid work once.

Nearly half (42 per cent) of leisure workers admitted to doing it more than once.

Food poisoning was the most popular lie to tell employers, with 26.76 per cent of workers using it as their excuse.

Leisure sector workers rank second only to employees in the retail sector as the most likely to ‘pull sickies’. Three quarters (76 per cent) of retail employees admit to pulling at least one sickie during the year.

At the other end of the table, people in teacher training and education are the least likely to pull sickies, with 24 per cent admitting to lying about why they needed a day off.

The date was compiled by commercial property firm Savoy Stewart.

Separate figures from insight firm Kantar show that, in total, around 8.6 million people threw sick days in 2019.

"Sickies" are estimated to cost UK employers around £34m each year.