An employee discounts platform offers your team access to deals, vouchers, cashback or other money-saving opportunities via a website or app. Savings are usually made on everyday purchases like groceries, gym membership, or clothing or on bigger items like entertainment tickets, meals out or holidays. An increasingly popular part of many employee benefits packages, a discounts platform can make a big difference to your employees’ daily finances, as well as making them feel supported and valued.
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Key takeaways:
- Employee discounts can help lower financial stress for your team.
- Showing that you care about employees’ lives outside work, and their financial futures, can help you recruit and retain top talent.
- Introducing a discounts platform can be as simple as signing up to a provider, but consider which one will work best for your company.
- Maximise the impact by integrating discounts into a wider financial wellbeing strategy.
Benefits of employee discounts
Introducing a discounts platform can bring a host of advantages, including:
Reduce financial stress
Financial stress can be a big contributor to poor mental health amongst employees. With the cost of living rising, increasing numbers of people are feeling hopeless (10%), anxious (34%) or stressed (29%) about money, according to research from The Mental Health Foundation. That stress can then impact productivity at work, as well as negatively affecting sleep, physical health and personal relationships.
Discounts can help reduce financial stress by lowering certain costs. For example, a family spending £200 a month on groceries could save £20 a month with a 10% discount; that would add up to £240 a year. In addition to everyday cost savings, larger treats like meals out, cinema tickets or theme park visits could be much more affordable.
Improve staff retention
Showing employees that you support them inside and outside work can make them more likely to stick around. Although employee turnover trends are shifting after a period of volatility, some industries still see a relatively high level of ‘churn’. With every employee that leaves, you lose the time and energy you’ve put into onboarding and training them, plus the extra cost of hiring someone new. So, making employees feel valued with a benefit that makes a tangible difference can help preserve talent in your company.
Ease recruitment burden
Recruiting the right new employees can be tough, especially when you’re competing with similar companies in your field. Studies suggest that benefits can be an important part of decision-making for prospective employees, with 42% of jobseekers seeing them as a key priority. Adding discounts to your benefits package can show new recruits that you want to make a real difference to their everyday life.
How to implement an employee discounts platform
Setting up your employee discounts is best done through an existing provider or platform. They will do the leg-work of sourcing deals and setting up partnerships, as well as providing the means for your employees to access these. Usually, this is through a website or app. Your provider will help you set up the platform and may be able to add your company branding to make it more tailored to your company.
It’s worth choosing a provider carefully, with consideration of which discounts your employees actually want, ease of access and how much the platform will cost you.
Furthermore, it’s important to think about how the discounts will fit into your wider benefits package. It’s great to help employees with the cost of living, but you can expand that support by embedding the discounts into a wider financial wellbeing strategy.
For example, Maji’s digital tools help employees create and stick to spending plans, which also highlight where they might save with relevant discounts. What’s more, longer-term financial planning tools and helpful guides help employees put their savings away for the future.
When introducing your employee discounts platform, you should also consider how to get the word out. To maximise return on your investment, employees need to use their deals! Again, this is where an app like Maji can come in useful. As employees log in to track their spending, they will see which discounts they can use, and exactly how much they’ll save.
Conclusion
Employee discounts can be a great way to support employees with the cost of living and make a tangible impact on their finances. Building a helpful benefits package can lead to greater productivity plus better recruitment and retention. With a little consideration as to which discounts and platform would work best for your team, you could make a big difference to their everyday lives.
If you’d like to hear more about how Maji’s digital platform and discounts package can help you and your employees, schedule a demo.
FAQ
Is it worth investing in employee discounts?
Making a small investment in your employees’ wellbeing through introducing discounts can be well worth it. You can make a tangible difference to their lives in addition to improving recruitment and retention of talented employees.
Is it difficult to implement employee discounts?
It’s usually easy to introduce an employee discounts package when you work with an established provider. It’s often as simple as registering your company and either uploading employee details or allowing them to create their own accounts. You may also need to educate employees on the benefit so they know what they’re entitled to and how to access it.
Do employee discounts impact financial wellbeing?
Employee discounts can make a difference to financial wellbeing by lowering everyday costs. However, it’s important to consider your wider financial wellbeing strategy to make sure the impact is positive and lasting.
