EXCLUSIVE: More than one third (39%) of employee respondents feel their employer cares about their financial wellbeing, according to research by Neyber.
Its The DNA of financial wellbeing 2017 report, which surveyed 10,004 employees and 516 HR directors, also found that 75% of employer respondents believe their employees feel as though the organisation cares about their financial wellbeing.
The research also found:
- 17% of employer respondents plan to focus on the financial wellbeing of their workforce as a priority over the next 12 months, 22% cite improving their employee benefits package as a top priority, and 13% view the provision of financial education and awareness initiatives as a top priority.
- 29% of employer respondents provide financial education for employees, and 42% are likely to offer this within the next year.
- 21% of employer respondents currently offer employees access to affordable loans, and 35% are likely to do so over the next 12 months.
- 39% of employee respondents feel their organisation does not communicate about anything to do with financial support, and 56% of employer respondents rank themselves highly in this area.
- 54% of employer respondents believe that poor financial wellbeing has an impact on employee behaviour, 56% feel it affects job performance, 54% see an impact on relationships at work, and 51% think it affects relationships with management.
- 48% of employee respondents regularly borrow money to meet their basic financial needs.
- 3% of employee respondents would turn to their employer if they had money worries, compared to 24% of employer respondents that think employees would turn to their manager if they have money worries, and 15% that believe staff would talk to their HR team.
- 33% of employee respondents cite financial worries as their biggest concern, compared to 29% that cite health as a concern, and 28% that cite work-life balance as a concern.
Heidi Allan (pictured), head of insights and engagement at Neyber, said: “It’s all well and good offering a lot of benefits, but if employees are not able to manage month-on-month and are regularly borrowing to meet basic financial needs then they simply do not have the financial capacity to make use of what is available to them.
"We asked employees whether they thought their employer cared about them in respect of their wellbeing, and the highest proportion said they thought their employer cared about their career wellbeing (58%), whereas only 39% said they felt they cared about their financial wellbeing.
"When you compare that to the view of the [organisation], 75% of employers thought their employees felt the organisation cared about [employee] financial wellbeing so there is quite a large disconnect between the perception and the reality."
