A recent survey has found that UK employees are failing to grasp the amount their employers are spending on their benefits. In most cases, the employees would underestimate the value of their benefits package.

As Guy Logan of Personnel Today reported, the survey by consulting firm Aon of 1,300 respondents revealed that;

• Only 2% of adult workers believe that their employers spend the equivalent of 20% of their salaries on benefits.
• More than 2 in 3 believed their employers spent 10% of their salary on benefits.
• Almost 50% believed the figure was less than 5% off their salaries.

The survey found that typically, if an employee’s salary was £26,000 a year, an equivalent of 21% of this salary was spent on their benefits.

As the statistics showed, employees were substantially underestimating their employer’s investment in their benefits. This in turn can be detrimental to employee loyalty and motivation and it is essential that employers fully communicate their investment to employees.

As Aon’s Gareth Ashley-Jones stated in the report, “employers are underselling themselves…if employers are to be genuinely valued by staff, then employees need to understand the scale of investment being made on their behalf.”

What may be required is a transparency of true monetary worth of an employee’s benefits as a constituent part of their remuneration package. This would involve the development of a clear and detailed communication channel, to raise awareness of benefits as an investment made by employers and to communicate their value.

When an employee understands that their employer is investing heavily in their benefits package, they are more likely to feel engaged, loyal and motivated. This in turn has positive effects on productivity which is a key justification of the employer’s original investment in a benefits platform.
Peoplevalue are working closely with clients of their Advantage voluntary benefits platrform to develop and implement key collateral that will be used to communicate the true value of their benefits to employees. This will raise awareness and cultivate an understanding of the client’s investment in their employees.

Communication is key.

With the dual onslaught of inflation and high interest rates, Peoplevalue’s Advantage voluntary benefits solution has the real potential to maximize a person’s disposable income and combat the crisis of consumer confidence.

The most recent findings from market research company Nielsen and the British Retail Consortium revealed that a third of the population had major concerns over the British economy. Based on the thoughts of a thousand consumers, the UK Consumer Confidence index now stands at 79, the lowest score since the survey began in 2003.

The apparent lack of confidence was also coupled with a sense of pessimism. 55% of people felt that their own personal finances would be poor in the coming year, and when asked what they did with any spare money, 22% of respondents admitted to having none. The fact that one in five has no disposable income after covering essentials reveals the importance and relevance of voluntary benefits solutions like Advantage.

Peoplevalue’s Advantage solution provides employees with access to thousands of discounted products and services, maximising their disposable income and improving their quality of life. With Advantage, an employee can make significant savings on essentials and non-essentials alike. Categories include everyday shopping, travel, sports and leisure, entertainment, CDs, DVDs, videos and games, health and beauty, cars and discounted retail vouchers.

Though non-essential spending is down overall as a direct result of this crisis in confidence, 24% or respondents still spent their spare money on new clothes, 21% on out of home entertainment, 24% on home improvement and 14% on new technology. This is where Advantage comes into its own and demonstrates an employers’ dedication to its employees and their efforts to improve their quality of life.

Advantage can be customised and branded in any corporate image and seamlessly integrated into any existing program, significantly enhancing the overall benefits package. Fully managed by Peoplevalue, Advantage offers the maximum benefit without the need to commit valuable resources and a potent tool with which to combat the crisis of consumer confidence.

“We are confident that with Advantage, we have developed a market-leading solution with the real potential to improve lives” says Mike Morgan, MD of Peoplevalue. “Our dedicated content management team is alert to consumer habits. They have worked diligently and with a market awareness to create a valuable resource for employees who can benefit from real and relevant discounts in the areas of their spending. By saving them money and maximizing their disposable incomes, Advantage lets them get more out of life than they could normally afford to,” he concluded.

According to a recent survey by Investors in People UK, nearly one third of UK employees feel de-motivated in their current role.

In the survey, reported by HR Zone, 43% even went so far as to suggest they plan on leaving thier job in the next year as a direct result of their lack of motivation.

The survey found that the top three de-motivating factors were;

1. Unreasonable Workload - 18%
2. Feeling Underpaid - 18%
3. Lack of a clear career path - 17%

In addition, nearly a quarter of the respondents felt they were not fully supported by their managers. De-motivation was found to be highest at 39% in larger organisations of 5000 employees or more compared to the 30% in organisations of between 50 and 250 employees.

Especially interesting in light of the PPMA’s conference, was the finding that de-motivation was highest at 41% in the Public Sector with 44% even claiming they were less motivated than they were a year ago.

Singing from the same sadly pessimistic hymsheet was the UK’s largest independent recruitment-agency scoring company Hirescores.com, who in an interview with HRLook, reported that London-based workers topped a table of unhappy workers in the UK. 74% of London workers said that they thought about finding a new job at least once a day. Almost 1700 people participated in the survey, which saw the South East and Northern Ireland complete the unhappy top 3 with 69% and 51% of workers respectively thinking of trying to find another job at least once daily.

In his interview with HR Zone, Simon Jones, Chief Executive of Investors in People UK lamented, “this research reveals a worrying picture, not only because such a significant proportion of UK employees are de-motivated, but because it suggests that valuable employees may be heading for the door.”

High levels of employee churn will always follow in de-motivation’s shadow. A lack of motivation not only effects productivity and employee retention, but it is also highly detrimental to a business’ bottom line.

Peoplevalue’s Excellence awards systems allow an employer to proactively prevent de-motivation from building any momentum - before it has the chance to effect productivity and morale. They make it possible to reward, recognise and inspire employees in the workplace and create a clear structure of support and motivation. Both employers and employees will reap the benefits.

Thomsons Online Benefits‘ 2008 Employee Rewards Watch survey showed, that the number of companies who had implemented a flexible benefits package had increased to 23.91%. This had increased from the 5% who had a flexible benefits scheme in 2004. In addition, over a quarter (25.27%) were considering the implementation of a flexible benefits scheme in the next calendar year.

Of the 755 UK employers who responded, a 63.19% majority believed that their reward strategy was effective in meeting the objectives of attracting and retaining talent, driving better business performance and driving better individual performance.

The survey also showed that 20.71% of respondents used web based employee benefts software, up nearly 12% from last year.

Thomsons Online Benefits currently use Peoplevalue’s Advantage voluntary benefits platform as a part of their flexible benefits packages. For the full report, click here