It’s incredibly difficult to gauge what your employees want at the best of times. Are they looking for a pay rise? What about a transfer to another office? Do they want to move on?
All challenging questions for sure, but one of the most difficult of all is, quite simply, which perks are your staff members going to make use of? There’s no point in spending lots of money on useless benefits that nobody is going to utilise.
This article will give you an overview of popular choices on the market so that you get the most bang for your buck.
Childcare vouchers
With the rising costs of daycare, it is only natural that the government’s tax-free childcare vouchers programme would appeal to increasing numbers of mums and dads across the UK. In fact, from 2012 to 2013, there was a six per cent increase in the number of companies offering the perk as a voluntary option.
According to Employee Benefits, 76 per cent of businesses in Britain offer tax-free credits that can be spent at nurseries and daycare centres across the country, although these establishments must be registered with the government for the tokens to be applicable.
However, for HR teams, this can be something of a struggle to organise, so many companies choose to arrange a partnership with firms like You at Work, which can provide solutions to employers for childcare vouchers.
Cycle to Work
Employees are increasingly looking to get on their bikes and make use of tax-free, voluntary benefits for bicycles. The coalition government’s Cycle to Work scheme allows Britons to purchase a bike tax-free through a salary sacrifice programme – with money filtered out of the staff member’s pay slip.
While not everyone is keen to don the lycra and pedal into the office, the positives of being more active are obvious, with reduced absenteeism proven among cyclists. This hasn’t gone unnoticed by the UK’s business community and 62 per cent of firms in the country currently offer this benefit to their workforce – up from 53 per cent in 2012.
Gym membership
It seems more and more Britons are looking to get fit, with gym memberships becoming an increasingly popular offering for employers seeking to decrease the amount of sick days staff members take by encouraging a healthy lifestyle.
Some 37 per cent of organisations surveyed by Employee Benefits said they have either given out or subsidised gym memberships for employees, an increase of four per cent from 2012 levels.
Retail or leisure discounts
Retail or leisure discounts are a relatively old-fashioned benefit that some workers are shunning, but contrary to some industry commentators’ predictions, their popularity is increasing in the UK market.
Some 32 per cent of firms across Britain offer their personnel reductions on the costs of everyday products, which represents an impressive rise of nine per cent compared to 2009. Part of this is down to the increasing willingness of people in the UK to spend a bit more money when they go out to eat.
Sales at restaurants in the service sector have heightened dramatically since the beginning of the recession, but in many cases this has also come with a rise in prices and this means Diner’s Cards are becoming increasingly popular for employees.
