EXCLUSIVE: Centrica has added three new benefits to its flexible benefits package for its 30,000 employees.
The energy organisation, which owns British Gas (pictured), is also continually communicating the benefits through its summer roadshows to help drive up employee engagement with benefits.
It launched the new benefits in its flex enrolment window in May, with employees’ choices taking effect from June.
The new benefits include a financial education programme, provided by Nudge Global, a salary sacrifice technology benefit, as well as a dine out card, provided by Tastecard.
Kate Wild, head of benefits, Europe at Centrica, said: “We have been on a journey of improvement over the last few years with embedding new technology to support employees to make choices easier, and also introducing new benefits.
“We did formal polls on our internal social media site to find out what employees wanted and what benefits were popular, alongside external benchmarking.
“The new technology benefit was by far the most popular and it will be interesting to see where our take up goes on that.”
Centrica will continue to boost engagement with its employee benefits offering, as well as the new benefits available through summer roadshows, with the help of its providers.
But the flexible benefits scheme’s portal, provided by Benefex, has been the organisation’s key to improving take up.
It was designed to include single sign on with access available on various devices, including mobile, which aided take up among its engineers.
Centrica also has plans in 2015 to move to Benefex’s new platform, which aims to enhance employees’ shopping experiences when choosing benefits, when the product is launched.
Wild added: “Flex continues to evolve and our scheme will too. The technology was really about making flex available to our hugely mobile workforce.
“We are certainly seeing among staff, especially with new employees, that they are enjoying the flexibility to select benefits outside of work on mobile devices.
“Our roadshows will continue to help us build awareness of our scheme, the benefits, and so far the noise on social media has been positive.”
