Hi everyone
First post so please go easy on me! :)
I work for an independent company that leases and sells photocopiers and fax machines etc. As we are getting bigger and bigger we are naturally looking to recruit more staff. We seem to be struggling and coming up against a problem that our benefits & rewards package isn't as competitive as we had maybe once thought. At current we offer...
- Pension matching up to 2%
- Childcare Vouchers
- NHS top up scheme
- Bonuses (however these are not guaranteed and are based on the companies overall performance, not individual performance)
- Company car & phone (dependant on role)
I was wondering what sort of benefits everybody else gets/was offering, and what you classed as a 'beneficial' benefit!
Hope you can all help!
Many Thanks
Soph
Replies
Hi Sophie,
Well done, this is a great first post stimulating a wide range of responses! really like your idea to capture the total reward that your workforce will feel is beneficial to them and it will be most meaningful if your offer reflects those benefits etc.
This is a great example of using collaboration within a community of practice to seek best practice, well done. Don't forget to pop this on your CPD Record!
Debbie
That sounds like a great opportunity for CPD Sophie good luck, perhaps once you get some feedback you can let us all know how you decide to approach this?
Sarah
Hi again everyone!
Thanks very much for all your comments, it's made it quite clear to me that we don't offer nearly enough to keep up with our competition! Some great ideas in there which I'll definitely be looking into, especially if the only thing they cost the company is time.
Sarah - Thanks for the feedback! Part of my CPD is to introduce and administer the role out of an employee engagement survey within my organisation over the summer period, following on from this post I'll definitely be including a section around rewards and benefits to see how all my colleagues feel!
Clare, Karin, Ruth, Kate - Thanks again for all your feedback, really appreciate you taking the time to respond :)
Sophie
Hi Sophie,
I work for a not-for-profit organisation (around 80 staff). Our standard package is:
Increased holiday with service (starting at 23 days)
Increased pension with service (above employee contribution): i.e. up to 1 year - up to 4.5%, 1-4 years - up to 7.5 %, 4+ years - up to 12.5%
Childcare Vouchers
Holiday purchase scheme
Cycle to work scheme
Life Assurance (4x salary)
Health cover for managers and above
Company bonus
Season ticket loan (after 6 months' service)
Hope this helps! :)
Thanks
Kate
Hi Sophie
Congratulations on your first post!
Really good question and the answer will depend on the sector and industry which you work in. Also as you know total reward can comprise financial and non-financial benefits and it is sometimes the latter the employees really value.
Have you considered an employee survey to gauge how people feel about the current benefits but also asking what employees would like to see within their package (within reason!). This would inform what people see as a beneficial benefit. So for example buying and selling holiday was one of the popular benefits where I used to work, as was Retail Vouchers. We also used to provide total reward statements so employees could see the value of their package and not just focus on basic salary.
I hope this helps. Good luck with developing your reward offering!
Regards
Sarah
Hello Sophie,
We are a medium sized manufacturer, and our standard benefits package is:
We also offer access to:
I investigated the cycle to work scheme, but decided that it wasn't worth the administrative burden for the savings available to employees (it seemed they could get just as good a deal by going to the January sales).
As auto-enrolment will mean you have to make changes to your pension in the future, have you considered pre-empting those changes by upping your pension offering now?
Hope some of this is useful, and please don't be shy about asking again.
Ruth
Hi Sophie
I work for a SME and we have just been bought out by a Huge South African company, they introduced Private Medical and Life Insurance.
They also introduced Income protection. The company pay for all this as well as a 10% pension that they pay fully.
I do have to sat it is a very attractive package for new recruitment.
Perhaps your company could consider one of them.
Hope this is ok
Thanks
Karin
Hi Soph,
We have started to increase some benefits for our staff and some of the things that I have found have been popular but haven't cost the company too much either financially are as follows:
Holiday allowance increased on loyalty - although limited to a maximum of two days after two years - if they don't use them, they can be paid for these at the end of the holiday year.
The ability to 'purchase' holidays - those that struggle with their allowance currently can at least still have some extra time off.
A health cash plan - we use Medicash and this has been extremely popular with our staff - mainly because we have a quite young workforce so when taking a selection of staff from various age ranges, situations, backgrounds etc, it was almost a unanimous vote for the Health Cash plan over PMI. The staff make a minimal monthly contribution to this plan so we are not paying for it if they don't want it and it is extended to their partners as well at the corporate rate.
Cycle to work scheme - doesn't sound much but I am just rolling this out and it seems it will be more popular than I expected and this doesn't cost anything more than a bit of admin time - I am using Evans cycles for this and it is so easy.
You can also offer your staff some discounts as well for major retailers and if you PM me, then I can give you an overview of those.
Hope this helps and your first line tickled me - 'go easy on me' as I wonder if you have been stung like I was when posting on the Cipd Forum - I felt like I was being really slated for asking for help on there, it took me by surprise and I have never posted on there asking for help again.
Good luck and I hope this helps in some small way.
Clare