Latest / A Little Bit Richer / Make The Most Of Your Work Perks
Transcript
- 0:01Kia: Kia here, and this episode we're chatting about all things work.
- 0:04Kia: It's so easy to think that workplace benefits start and end with
- 0:08Kia: your salary, but if you're lucky, sometimes there's much more
- 0:11Kia: to it than that. You might be sitting on a
- 0:13Kia: huge pile of benefits that you had no idea about.
- 0:16Kia: This is getting a bit clickbaity, so I'm going to
- 0:18Kia: jump right into the episode. Joining me is Rebecca Moore
- 0:20Kia: from Liaise, a healthcare and specialist support service. So let's
- 0:23Kia: do it. I feel like I'm missing out here. What are some
- 0:26Kia: of the common benefits you might get if you're working
- 0:29Kia: for a company, Rebecca?
- 0:30Rebecca Moore: Workplace benefits go beyond salary, so you should really do
- 0:33Rebecca Moore: your research into what's on offer. Things to look out for,
- 0:36Rebecca Moore: things like health insurance, pension schemes, paid leave. Some companies
- 0:41Rebecca Moore: go the extra mile to offer extra perks like flexible
- 0:45Rebecca Moore: working programs, opportunities for professional development and wellbeing programs. So
- 0:49Rebecca Moore: you've got your employee assistance programs and even flexible pay
- 0:53Rebecca Moore: and things like that.
- 0:54Kia: Should our listeners be looking at more than just a
- 0:56Kia: salary when they change jobs, because people are looking at
- 0:59Kia: different jobs - is it just the money? Or if not,
- 1:03Kia: what other things should people be looking at?
- 1:05Rebecca Moore: Yeah, absolutely, salary's just one piece of the puzzle. That's
- 1:07Rebecca Moore: not the be all and end all, especially in this
- 1:09Rebecca Moore: day and age where we can feel the pinch in
- 1:11Rebecca Moore: lots of different areas. When evaluating job offers, you need
- 1:14Rebecca Moore: to look at the other things that are on offer as well.
- 1:16Rebecca Moore: Things like healthcare coverage, life assurance, staff discounts. These all
- 1:21Rebecca Moore: compound towards your financial wellbeing, so you should make sure
- 1:24Rebecca Moore: you're taking advantage of all those things and research what
- 1:26Rebecca Moore: the company's got o n offer for you, because you can
- 1:28Rebecca Moore: absolutely save a lot of money over time. Even things
- 1:31Rebecca Moore: like free car parking, it all adds up.
- 1:34Kia: That's a big one. It definitely does help.
- 1:35Rebecca Moore: Yeah, yeah.
- 1:36Kia: So when it comes to factoring in benefits, what would
- 1:41Kia: you say would be important? I know for me, when
- 1:43Kia: I was working and had one of my first jobs,
- 1:46Kia: healthcare was not something that I knew was important to me,
- 1:48Kia: but having access to people who could help me, doctors
- 1:53Kia: on tap, and being able to access things like counselling
- 1:56Kia: or things that I didn't realize were good benefits, but
- 1:58Kia: what should people really have a look and consider? What would be
- 2:00Kia: some key ones that you'd say, make sure that a
- 2:03Kia: company has X, Y, and Z. What would you say?
- 2:05Rebecca Moore: I think when you talk about that, about those benefits to
- 2:07Rebecca Moore: do with healthcare and counselling, most companies offer something called
- 2:11Rebecca Moore: an employee assistance program. It's probably one of the main
- 2:13Rebecca Moore: benefits that people tend to offer. On that, you normally
- 2:16Rebecca Moore: get a few free counselling sessions, and it's good to
- 2:19Rebecca Moore: have access to those things, because sometimes the NHS can
- 2:21Rebecca Moore: be a bit slow. You want to talk to someone
- 2:22Rebecca Moore: straight away. Normally with your EAP, you've got someone on
- 2:25Rebecca Moore: hand 24/ 7 that you can call them, have a
- 2:28Rebecca Moore: chat - it's not just about mental health and things like that,
- 2:31Rebecca Moore: but also financial counselling. Sometimes they put you in touch
- 2:35Rebecca Moore: with people that might give you just a bit more
- 2:37Rebecca Moore: of an insight into where you need to go, pinpoint you in
- 2:39Rebecca Moore: the right direction. You can even call them to ask for...
- 2:41Rebecca Moore: like if you've got something going on at home, like
- 2:43Rebecca Moore: legal problems or something, you could maybe get some advice
- 2:46Rebecca Moore: and they'll point you in the right direction there. So
- 2:48Rebecca Moore: that's really a good thing to have for employees.
- 2:51Kia: I think that's a key one. I think even just sitting
- 2:53Kia: down with your manager at work and saying, " What is
- 2:56Kia: available to me?" I know I've definitely done this a
- 2:58Kia: fair few times and said, " There's so much out there,
- 3:01Kia: what exactly is available to me as an employee?" And
- 3:04Kia: then you can have a look at that list and
- 3:06Kia: figure out what's going to work for you.
- 3:08Rebecca Moore: There's some other ones which are really good to have
- 3:10Rebecca Moore: where you can have access to a GP online where
- 3:13Rebecca Moore: you can ask them questions. It's difficult to get a
- 3:15Rebecca Moore: GP appointment when you want one sometimes, so it's good
- 3:17Rebecca Moore: to have that on hand where if you're just a bit
- 3:19Rebecca Moore: worried about something, you can have a little chat with
- 3:21Rebecca Moore: them. But that's a really good benefit to have. Not
- 3:23Rebecca Moore: all companies would offer that, but it's definitely something to
- 3:26Rebecca Moore: look out and ask for.
- 3:27Kia: I completely agree. Let's talk about a few other benefits.
- 3:30Kia: We covered some of the main big ones, but what
- 3:32Kia: maybe perhaps smaller ones are available to employees maybe when
- 3:36Kia: it comes to their finances or things that they can
- 3:38Kia: have a look at to make maybe the financial burden
- 3:40Kia: a little bit easier if they're feeling that pressure?
- 3:43Rebecca Moore: Something very high up on the employee benefits agenda at
- 3:46Rebecca Moore: the moment, and something that I'm definitely looking at for
- 3:48Rebecca Moore: my colleagues at my company, is having access to flexible pay.
- 3:52Rebecca Moore: And I think probably for the younger generation as well,
- 3:56Rebecca Moore: having access to your earned wages before payday, can sometimes
- 3:59Rebecca Moore: ease that financial burden. If you've had something emergency come
- 4:02Rebecca Moore: up that you need a bit of extra cash for,
- 4:05Rebecca Moore: it's good to be able to access your earned wages
- 4:07Rebecca Moore: before payday, and it stops you going to things like
- 4:09Rebecca Moore: loan sharks and things like that where they're going to
- 4:11Rebecca Moore: give you massive interest rates, so that's a good benefit
- 4:15Rebecca Moore: to look out for. For the company I work for
- 4:17Rebecca Moore: at the moment, we've introduced something called Wage Dream where
- 4:19Rebecca Moore: colleagues can go onto an app - they have good visibility
- 4:22Rebecca Moore: of the wages that they've earned so far, and also
- 4:25Rebecca Moore: if they do overtime or something like that, they can
- 4:27Rebecca Moore: have access to that money quicker than having to wait
- 4:29Rebecca Moore: till payday. So if they wanted to go out next week,
- 4:32Rebecca Moore: maybe they'll pick up a few extra hours this week
- 4:34Rebecca Moore: and then they can access those funds to get that
- 4:36Rebecca Moore: money quicker without having to wait.
- 4:38Kia: I think that's a good thing to have access to,
- 4:39Kia: especially as an employee. It's a good oversight and it
- 4:42Kia: feeds into that money management. We tend to focus on
- 4:45Kia: budgeting when it comes to the final stage once it
- 4:48Kia: gets paid into your account and what am I going
- 4:50Kia: to budget my money for? But if you know during
- 4:52Kia: the month how much you've currently earned, and maybe I'm
- 4:55Kia: going to do a few more hours, like you said,
- 4:56Kia: to be able to have a bit of extra money, it's a good way
- 4:59Kia: to keep on top of your money. I think that's
- 5:00Kia: a good point you made there.
- 5:01Rebecca Moore: Yeah. One good thing about these apps as well is
- 5:03Rebecca Moore: sometimes they allow you to put money away before you
- 5:06Rebecca Moore: get the money into your bank account. So you don't
- 5:08Rebecca Moore: really notice it as much when you're trying to save
- 5:11Rebecca Moore: that 50 pounds or 10 pounds you might put away
- 5:13Rebecca Moore: every month that you won't even realize that's come out.
- 5:15Rebecca Moore: When you look in your saving pot, then it grows
- 5:18Rebecca Moore: quite quickly. You don't even notice it.
- 5:19Kia: I think that's great. Exactly. Anything that we can do to make
- 5:22Kia: everything feel a little bit easier, but we're still planning
- 5:24Kia: for our finances, is a win in my books. That's
- 5:27Kia: what I think, for sure. So Rebecca, are there any
- 5:29Kia: traps to be aware of when it comes to taking
- 5:31Kia: advantage of workplace benefits? Like for example, is there something
- 5:35Kia: that's likely to be cheaper elsewhere?
- 5:37Rebecca Moore: Yeah, that's a good question actually. While workplace benefits do
- 5:40Rebecca Moore: offer convenience, it's important to compare cost and coverage. I'd
- 5:43Rebecca Moore: definitely say that. So maybe healthcare benefits might not cover
- 5:47Rebecca Moore: everything, and you might need to just assess if it's cost-
- 5:50Rebecca Moore: effective, compared to maybe getting private cover. And then just
- 5:54Rebecca Moore: make sure you're looking at potential tax implications for benefits
- 5:57Rebecca Moore: like healthcare, because sometimes that might add onto that. It
- 6:01Rebecca Moore: might not make it beneficial for you. So it's worthwhile
- 6:04Rebecca Moore: doing your research around those points.
- 6:06Kia: Completely agree. I think it's worthwhile just understanding and knowing
- 6:09Kia: what could come up, and just having a good overview
- 6:12Kia: over everything.
- 6:12Rebecca Moore: Yeah. Some companies do things like cycle to work schemes,
- 6:16Rebecca Moore: parking's paid for, or the development programs for professional development.
- 6:20Rebecca Moore: Maybe they've got apprenticeships you can go on and advance
- 6:23Rebecca Moore: your career that way, and then obviously you are not
- 6:25Rebecca Moore: having to pay for those things yourself, and that will
- 6:28Rebecca Moore: be better financially for you in the long run, because
- 6:29Rebecca Moore: you've managed to get a qualification. Also, you need to
- 6:33Rebecca Moore: look at flexible working arrangements, other things they have an
- 6:36Rebecca Moore: offer, like the employee assistance programs, maybe they've got an
- 6:40Rebecca Moore: app where you can go on and get discounts from
- 6:43Rebecca Moore: high street stores and things, and all those little bits
- 6:45Rebecca Moore: mount up.
- 6:46Kia: They all mount up. And I think what you mentioned about
- 6:48Kia: the employee development program, I definitely did that at one of my
- 6:51Kia: jobs. I used that and took advantage of it to
- 6:54Kia: another language, which is always useful. It's something I always
- 6:56Kia: wanted to do, and it's even better when my employee
- 6:58Kia: wants to pay me to learn a language.
- 7:00Rebecca Moore: Yeah, absolutely.
- 7:00Kia: So that's a very key point you made there.
- 7:01Rebecca Moore: That's a great benefit.
- 7:03Kia: So for anyone listening, if you have listened to this
- 7:06Kia: podcast before, you'll know what's coming next. So Rebecca, I'm
- 7:09Kia: going to ask you a question. What are the three
- 7:12Kia: easy ways that people can use when it comes to
- 7:14Kia: workplace benefits to help them get a little bit richer?
- 7:19Rebecca Moore: Number one, I'd definitely say maximize pension contributions, especially the
- 7:23Rebecca Moore: employer matched ones. Number two, utilize your wellbeing programs, gym
- 7:27Rebecca Moore: discounts, things like that. It all adds up and contributes
- 7:31Rebecca Moore: to your health overall. So definitely go for that. And
- 7:33Rebecca Moore: then number three, explore your employee share purchase plans. They're
- 7:37Rebecca Moore: a really smart investment opportunity, and I think I would
- 7:40Rebecca Moore: definitely encourage that.
- 7:41Kia: I completely echo that. I've definitely taken advantages of all
- 7:44Kia: of those that you've mentioned when I've been in different jobs before.
- 7:48Kia: So thank you so much, Rebecca. These have been some
- 7:50Kia: amazing gems that you've given to all of our listeners here,
- 7:53Kia: and it's been incredible. So thank you so much. Some
- 7:56Kia: great tips for saving money there, and you're going to
- 7:58Kia: need them, because next week I'm talking about a big one.
- 8:01Kia: It's something that's on a lot of people's minds a
- 8:03Kia: lot of the time, and that's a buying a house.
- 8:06Kia: Is it a pipe dream if you're a Gen Z or millennial?
- 8:08Kia: Come back next week to find out. And if this
- 8:10Kia: podcast has connected with you, then you know the score
- 8:12Kia: by now - hit follow, tell your friends, and keep on
- 8:15Kia: getting to grips with your money.