Heka launches workforce prediction tool to flag health risks before absence rises

Employee benefits platform Heka has launched a workforce prediction tool designed to help employers identify emerging health and wellbeing risks before they translate into absence, presenteeism, employee turnover or healthcare claims.

Vantage, available to Heka customers from 1 October, analyses anonymised behavioural, booking and demographic data from across an organisation and compares emerging patterns with independent research.

The platform then recommends actions employers could take in response, ranging from targeted wellbeing campaigns to changes in workload, policy, manager support, communications and benefit investment.

The launch reflects a wider challenge for UK employers trying to take a more preventative approach to workforce health: much of the information traditionally available to HR teams, including absence figures, claims data and exit interviews, records problems after they have already affected employees or generated a cost.

Heka said Vantage is intended to provide an earlier indication of where health pressures may be developing across particular teams or workforce groups.

For example, an increase in employees accessing stress and sleep-related support could indicate growing pressure within part of an organisation. Vantage can identify the pattern and recommend targeted intervention before it becomes more visible through absence or reduced productivity.

The technology draws on more than 100,000 bookings recorded through Heka’s employee benefits platform during the past 36 months.

Unlike workforce benchmarks based primarily on surveys or self-reported information, Heka said the system uses behavioural data showing the types of health and wellbeing support employees are actually accessing.

This could give employers another source of workforce health intelligence alongside employee surveys, absence data and benefits utilisation figures, particularly as organisations look to understand risks including stress, presenteeism and preventable ill health earlier.

Heka said 98.5 per cent of bookings made through its platform relate to preventative health, while its customers have recorded an 8 per cent year-on-year reduction in private medical insurance claims.

The company also points to Deloitte research on the potential business cost of poor mental health and the financial returns associated with preventative workplace mental health interventions.

Vantage sits alongside Heka’s existing personalised employee benefits platform, which provides access to hundreds of UK partners covering areas including counselling, sleep, fitness, nutrition and financial wellbeing.

Where the existing technology personalises support for individual employees, Vantage is designed to give HR and leadership teams an organisation-level view of emerging trends.

Employers will not be able to see individual employees’ activity. Heka said the tool uses anonymised information and reports patterns at group and workforce segment level.

Alex Hind, CEO and co-founder of Heka, said: “We’ve spent years building the clearest picture there is of what employees actually need, one booking at a time. Vantage turns that picture into early warning for the whole business. HR teams see where pressure is building weeks before it shows up in absence or attrition, and they get a clear, ready to run recommendation, backed by everything already on the Heka platform. That’s what makes Vantage the only workforce prediction tool built to fix what it finds.”

The development comes as employers increasingly look beyond benefits utilisation towards understanding how workforce health data can inform prevention, organisational risk and wellbeing strategy.

Vantage will be available to Heka customers from 1 October 2026.