UK businesses have a wide range of choice when it comes to investing in employee benefits. The decision you make can have a major bearing on how successful you are in attracting and retaining talent – and enabling them to be happy, healthy and at their best.
Here, we’ve provided a snapshot of employee benefits for you to consider – most of which we can help you with:
Give your employees access to fast private medical care and a range of additional benefits, including wellness apps and Employee Assistance Programmes.
Ensure your employees’ families are financially protected in the event of their death by taking out a Group Life Insurance policy
Get extra financial protection for your employees should they be unable to work due to illness or injury beyond the statutory sick pay allowance. Staff also get access to rehab services to help speed up recovery.
Give your staff extra financial protection in the event they are diagnosed with a critical illness.
Allow your staff to get rapid dental treatment and checkups with a standalone private dental plan.
Give staff access to everyday health and wellbeing services, such as physiotherapy, dentistry, optical care and more – up to a predetermined cash amount.
Financially protect your business from the impact of losing an essential member of your team.
A suite of self-help tools and professional counselling and/or advisory services designed to bolster the emotional wellbeing of your employees.
Reward your employees with a range of discounts across health, leisure and retail services – all housed on a digital platform.
Formulate a range of wellbeing benefits that support every aspect of your team’s mental and emotional wellbeing, including interventions like: wellness days, meditation classes, CBT tools, gym memberships, counselling services and more.
A broad area which can cover remote/hybrid working arrangements, gym memberships, discount schemes, parental leave and much more.
For FREE access to impartial advice and personalised quotes, email [email protected] or call: 01273 974419
An employee benefits package is a key weapon in the armoury for any business looking to recruit and retain talented employees. An employee survey by QuickBooks, revealed that almost half (48%) of workers feel benefits would make them stay at their job even if another company offered them a raise, while nine in ten claimed they’d give up a 5% raise in exchange for more benefits.
Another recent survey concluded that the talent shortage is at a 15-year high which suggests the importance of delivering an enticing benefits programme is increasing.
The best employee benefit schemes provide effective health and wellbeing support to the whole team, helping them remain happy, healthy and motivated. The business itself stands to benefit in unnumerable ways, including through:
“Engage Health Group were great. Quick to respond, knowledgeable and personable. They worked on an ideal plan for my business and it was up & running at pace.”
We begin by learning about your business, its current challenges and desired outcomes.
We provide insider knowledge into what business of a similar size and sector offer their workers.
We work out the best solutions for your business, present them to you and agree on timeframes.
We liaise with ALL insurer and service providers to obtain the most competitive pricing.
We set up and implement the policy/scheme on your behalf to ensure a smooth start.
We provide bespoke literature and perform onsite presentations to promote benefits to staff.
We handle the everyday management of the scheme so you don’t have to.
We perform annual market reviews to ensure your scheme remains effective and competitively priced.
Each business has its own unique culture. But certain pearls of wisdom apply to all companies whatever the industry, workforce demographics or budget. In our experience the following considerations are often overlooked by businesses with an established benefits scheme.
Placing all your focus in just one camp can leave your benefit provision lacking. An insurance-heavy approach (Group Health Insurance and Death in Service, for example), whilst excellent to provide, can leave staff disengaged, as these types of benefits are only realised when staff are unwell or the worst happens. They are the benefits they hope they’ll never need!
A wellness-heavy approach (gym membership and stress management services, for example) is proven to make staff feel more engaged as the benefits can be utilised more frequently. However, they aren’t much use if someone needs physiotherapy or an urgent diagnostic scan.
When piecing together an employee benefits scheme, a blended approach can deliver the best of both worlds.
Once you have decided upon your benefits strategy, it’s important to educate your employees. They need to know what they have and how to use it, otherwise the benefits will likely to become redundant and unappreciated.
If you are using an independent intermediary to assist you with sourcing, devising and implementing your benefits provision, do ask them to assist in how best to communicate the finished article to employees. Any good intermediary/benefit consultancy will be happy to deliver employee presentations, develop bespoke written guidance and spend time at your premises to answer employee questions and promote the value being provided.
Many organisations make the mistake of managing different types of coverage across separate departments. For example, insurance policies such as Group Medical Insurance and Business Income Protection are sometimes managed by a finance department, whereas wellness provision such as Health Cash Plans and Health Screening are managed by HR.
This compartmentalised approach reduces the opportunity to drive cost efficiencies. If your business is working with multiple insurance service providers via different business departments, it’s likely you will pay more overall, encounter greater confusion and find it increasingly difficult to achieve your overall objective.
Even if you are spending a small percentage of gross payroll on benefits, continuous review should be a priority. Some key questions to ask:
An annual review (as a minimum) will help avoid stagnation, maintain relevance and ensure businesses get the best possible return on their investment.
The tax status of employee benefits varies according to the specific policy in question.
Business Health Insurance: Insurance premiums are usually classed as a Benefit in Kind which makes it taxable – this is normally paid for by employees through payroll. However, Business Health Insurance also attracts Insurance Premium Tax (IPT), but this is automatically included in the cost of the premium.
Group Life Insurance: There is good news for both employer and worker. The premium is usually allowable as a business expense, so tax can be claimed back on it. Meanwhile the employee is not taxed on the value of the premium. The policy is also kept in a ‘discretionary trust’ so it avoids liability for Inheritance or Income Tax.
Group Income Protection: Essentially, there is no tax liable from employee or employer until a payout is made, in which case it’s taxed via PAYE as per the normal wage. Furthermore, it’s usually an allowable business expense for the employer too.
Group Critical Illness cover: The employee will need to pay tax on the value of the premium. HMRC will alter the tax code to reduce their tax-free personal allowance – the reduction will be the equivalent of the value of the premium the business is paying for them.
On the plus side, the policy is paid out as a tax-free lump sum. It’s also considered a business expense which means the business can claim back against Corporation Tax.
Business Health Cash Plan: The same as above – the employee will need to pay tax on its value via payroll and the company can claim it as a business expense.
Key Man Insurance: Is also normally treated as above – though there are possible exceptions.
Health Screening: In most cases, a single health assessment and/or single medical check-up per employee is allowable each year as a tax-free benefit.
Employee Assistance Platform: An EAP is usually regarded as a business expense rather than a benefit in kind. Which is good news for the employee as it means they will normally avoid paying any tax on the benefit. However, there are exceptions.
Contact our expert team to learn the most effective methods for implementing employee benefits policies into your business. Contact [email protected] or call 01273 974419.
