When offering incentives to employees, the most popular benefits tend to be ones that provide support to themselves and their loved ones. This can take many forms – through life insurance, income protection or access to GPs for example.
Two incentives that could be of particular benefit to employees are childcare and eldercare. Though they may initially appear to be completely different, these two benefits actually have a lot in common.
What are they and how do they work?
Childcare is an important part of many employees’ lives. When they’re unable to care for their child due to work, it’s important that the child is still getting the appropriate level of care, be it from a nursery or a childminder. Ensuring that a child is well looked after and is still getting the help they need in learning and development is critical, and childcare is understandably high on the list of benefits that employees look for from a business.
At the other end of the spectrum, eldercare refers to the care of elderly people who are unable to look after themselves. Again, it’s important that there is someone to care for them while the employee is at work. This can be done at a residential care home, or by visiting their home. Though eldercare benefits are often not as widespread as childcare, an increasingly ageing population means that the number of workers with eldercare responsibilities is likely to grow substantially in the near future.
Why they’re important
The ongoing cost-of-living crisis in the UK has left a lot of workers anxious about rising costs. Prices for everyday items are increasing rapidly, and as a result, many find themselves unable to afford the already high costs of childcare and eldercare.
Help with childcare costs has often been a popular benefit for businesses to offer their employees, whether to stop sudden absenteeism or to help employees back to work. Eldercare is not quite as common, but with an ageing population and more people dependent on others, offering it as an incentive can help with attracting and retaining employees. When creating an insurance policy for employees, businesses should take both of these into consideration. One way of doing this is by offering employees company life insurance that takes themselves and their families into account. A good example of this is Group Life Insurance. When taken out, this policy pays the beneficiaries of an employee a sum of money (either a lump sum or a multiple of the employee’s salary) in the event of their death. Often, these policies also give employees access to a virtual GP, which can be very beneficial to those who are looking after young children or elderly relatives. This policy is paid for by the business, so employees will not have to pay anything, and all employees are automatically covered.
As you can see, both childcare and eldercare benefits are essential elements of any employee benefits package.
As the number of people seeking help with childcare and eldercare costs increases, offering both of these in one package is a common sense move that can go a long way towards hiring and retaining staff.