OKLAHOMA CITY (Feb. 3, 2026) — Paycom Software, Inc. (NYSE: PAYC) (“Paycom”), a leading provider of comprehensive, cloud-based human capital management software, released new insights on job attendance for the Monday following the Super Bowl, revealing how one of the nation’s largest sports events influences workforce capacity and solutions to mitigate exposure to understaffing.
As Sunday’s big game approaches, companies should anticipate an increase in employees calling in sick Monday. Paycom data shows sick-day requests increased 45% nationwide on the Monday after the 2025 Super Bowl, compared to the average workday.
Additional Paycom findings show:
- Time-off requests were up 12% for the Monday after the Super Bowl, underscoring that some employees aren’t just calling in unexpectedly — many are strategically planning their time off in advance, adding further complexity to employers’ staffing efforts.
- Sick-day requests dominated in December 2025, accounting for four of the year’s five biggest spikes, with the exception being a post‑Grammys surge Feb. 3.
Unexpected staffing shortages can lead to lost revenue, inability to meet customer demands, strained resources, decreased productivity and more. Proactivity is the key to mitigating the impact of understaffing, such as using advanced HR technology that leverages automated decision logic to maintain coverage standards and minimize manual intervention.
“In today’s fast-paced work environment, a surge of last-minute time-off requests and reactive approvals from overwhelmed managers with decision fatigue can lead to accidental understaffing,” said Jason Bodin, executive vice president of marketing and communications at Paycom. “With Paycom’s automated time-off request feature, organizations can ensure requests are consistent and automatically account for capacity needs, taking the burden of staffing off a manager’s plate.”
The award-winning Time-Off Requests tool featuring GONE® uses automated decision logic to instantly approve or deny time-off requests based on preset company rules. By automatically identifying staffing gaps and ensuring coverage needs are met, it eliminates the need for managers to manually review each request and detect potential shortages.
GONE’s impact extends across industries, with broader data showing its measurable impact. According to a 2024 Forrester Consulting Total Economic Impact™ study commissioned by Paycom, a composite organization representative of interviewed Paycom clients using GONE received a projected return on investment of up to 821% over three years.
“With [Paycom’s] GONE, I know that all PTO requests are going to be handled instantly and fairly, without considering which individual is requesting it,” an HR director in the retail industry told Forrester.
Learn more about Paycom’s automated time-off request decisioning here.
Methodology
The results represent the sick-day and time-off requests made in 2025 by over seven million employees across Paycom’s clients. The analyzed group includes both full- and part-time employees of organizations operating in the United States. Sick-day requests include any amount of sick time requested by an employee on a given day.
