The Journey Beyond Bike Week… Employee Wellbeing Ideas that Save Money and Reduce Stress

Inclusivity matters and cycling may not be for everyone, so your employee wellbeing benefits should include a gym discount scheme alongside any cycling-related employee benefits. Wellbeing encompasses more than the physical; it includes mental and financial elements, but for this blog, we’re focusing on movement and helping employees become more active.

Click on the blogs below for more information on building mental and financial workplace benefits into your strategy:

• Creating a brighter tomorrow... financial wellbeing and mental wealth
• Employee money worries... Removing the stigma. Providing the solution
• Digital healthcare… enhancing employee wellness at every age
• Improving mental health in the workplace… affordable, impactful, essential!

Money-saving employee wellbeing ideas

Our blog, Workplace Wellbeing Activities Your Employees Need in their Lives, gives you six low-cost or cost-free ideas for embedding workplace wellbeing into your employees’ working week. 

Not all workplace wellbeing initiatives require investment, but outsourced workplace benefits incur costs. It’s essential to remember that workplace benefits are an investment, not an expense, and you can achieve an ROI through:

• Enhanced productivity.
• Reduced absenteeism and presenteeism.
• Better employee retention levels.
• Higher employee engagement.

These are all ways to drive a return on investment, but how can workplace benefits save your business and people money?

Employee savings…

Workplace benefits were once considered employee perks but have since evolved to become critical to employee retention and talent acquisition strategies due to the positives they bring to employees’ lives.

• Gym discount schemes: Our Gym and Fitness Discounts provide employees up to 25% off annual gym memberships. We partner with over 3,000 gyms, bootcamps and online digital fitness platforms; there’s something for everyone, saving all employees money on a healthier lifestyle.
• Cycle to Work Schemes: Along with savings on the RRP of a new bike, a Cycle to Work scheme comes with employee savings of up to 42% in tax and NI contributions.

A gym discount saves employees on the price of their memberships, but the salary sacrifice arrangement of a Cycle to Work scheme brings significant additional savings from reduced tax and NIC contributions. 

Employers save, too! 

Businesses can save up to 13.8% in National Insurance Contributions for every employee who uses a Cycle to Work scheme.

Stress-reducing workplace benefits

We’re focusing on physical wellbeing benefits, so you may be wondering why we’re discussing stress reduction - something usually associated with mental health. Bike Week campaigned about cycling as a great way to reduce stress because movement helps us release stress from our bodies, so stress and physical health are intrinsically linked,

• Gym discount schemes: We’ve established that our Gym and Fitness Discounts make exercise more affordable. What this means is that employees have a way to build regular exercise into their lives. Whether they start the day with a workout, boosting their endorphins, or use exercise as a mindful way to decompress, it’s a workplace benefit that alleviates employee stress.
• Cycle to Work Schemes: Employees don’t need to find the time to fit a workout into their busy schedule when they enrol in a Cycle to Work scheme and replace their car with their bike for their commute. Stress-reducing exercise is guaranteed twice a day!
• Virtual GP: Our digital healthcare platform, Online GP, takes the stress out of seeking medical support, with same-day GP appointments available with a choice of clinicians. It’s a workplace benefit that puts accessible and inclusive medical support at your employees’ fingertips - a boost for their physical health and significantly reducing health-related worries.

Healthy mind, healthy body… you’ll be familiar with the phrase. We must reference our Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) when discussing reducing employee stress. Giving employees a safe space to turn 24/7, 365, crisis support at the touch of a button, and wellbeing tools at the tip of their fingers is one of the most impactful ways to manage and reduce employee stress.

Workplace Wellbeing and Your Employee Retention Strategy

We’ve touched on saving money - for your people and business - and reducing stress, but what’s the bigger picture?

There are several. However, when discussing saving money and reducing stress, the topic of employee retention is fitting.

Businesses with high employee turnover face a hefty recruitment bill, costing tens of thousands of pounds every time they hire someone new. This presents a significant financial risk.

When turnover is high, the rest of your workforce feels the stress from covering unfilled roles and extra tasks, the time taken out of their day to interview candidates, and the work involved with bringing new employees up to speed.

High employee turnover suggests an unhappy workforce. 

Workplace wellbeing benefits vastly improve the employee experience. The research powering our Retention Risk Assessment found that workplace wellbeing and health-boosting initiatives were the number three employee priority, behind financial wellbeing benefits and reward and recognition.

Embedding workplace wellbeing ideas and benefits into your employee retention strategy is essential for reducing turnover.

Keep the Momentum Going with Pluxee UK

We’ve presented employee wellbeing ideas and a selection of workplace benefits that can save money and reduce stress. There are benefits for employees and businesses alike, but it’s not as simple as rolling out a benefit and waiting for people to use it.

Arrange a call with one of our employee engagement consultants to discover how to formulate a strategy that will see your people positively impacted by your workplace benefits and watch your business thrive.