All articles by System Administrator – Page 42
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Case Studies
Morgan Stanley responds to employee requests
Morgan Stanley uses its benefits package to gain a competitive edge, and has responded to employee requests for more choice and family-friendly policies.During the 13 years, Dawn Nicholson, managing director of HR for EMEA at Morgan Stanley, has worked in investment banking, she has seen a increase in the number ...
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Article
Easyjet's fear over shares
Easyjet fears that employee share ownership could fall at the airline, following the government's decision to move to a flat rate for capital gains tax (CGT) of 18% from April 2008.Announced in Alistair Darling's pre-Budget report last month, the move means that staff who are involved in sharesave schemes may ...
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Article
Pension tool for Daily Mail
Daily Mail & General Trust (DMGT) has launched an online pensions calculator, designed to help educate employees eligible to be members of its defined benefit (DB) pension scheme and to boost take-up rates.The calculator, provided by Orbit, allows DMGT's 4,800 newspaper staff to forecast their earnings on retirement. It also ...
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Article
Jim Savege moves from Staffordshire to Cumbria County Council
Staffordshire County Council's deputy corporate director (human resources), Jim Savege, is moving to Cumbria County Council where he will be corporate director for human resources and organisational development (OD). He said: "I expect [the new role] to be pretty challenging given the scale of Cumbria as a geographical area."
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Article
DC members failing to make investment choices
A study of defined contribution pensions has found that 80% of employees are investing in default investment options indicating they have not taken any proactive action about their investment strategy. The 2007 Default investment strategy survey from PensionDCisions, reports 68% of the 31 UK plans surveyed would prefer that fewer ...
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Case Studies
Buckinghamshire County Council struggled to find providers to match its needs
When Buckinghamshire County Council developed an idea for a new recognition-based employee benefit for its staff, it found that providers were not willing to build a new product to suit its needs.Gillian Hibberd, corporate director (people and policy), explains: "None of the providers have been able to come up with ...
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Article
Mitchells & Butler extends bonus sacrifice eligibility
PUB and restaurant company Mitchells & Butler is to allow retail managers to sacrifice their annual bonus into the company's defined contribution or defined benefit pension schemes for the first time.The company previously only allowed its 500 head office staff to sacrifice 100% of the gross value of their annual ...
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Article
Workplace happiness varies between sectors
Employee satisfaction levels with benefits varies considerably between industry sectors, according to research on The role of reward in happiness in the workplace from Employee Benefits and YouGov. Almost half (48%) of staff in the pharmaceuticals sector are fairly satisfied with their benefits, compared with under a third (28%) in ...
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Article
Midcounties Co-op Society launches voluntary benefits
Retailer Midcounties Co-operative Society has launched a voluntary benefits plan, including healthcare and green perks.Discounts on food intolerance tests, health screening, personal accident plans and an insurance product for cancer treatment are among the new health perks, while other benefits include incentives to take up green energy with Npower and ...
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Article
Competitive base pay most important for recruitment
Just under a fifth (19%) of UK staff rate competitive benefits, other than retirement and healthcare perks, as an important factor that would influence their decision to join an organisation.According to Towers Perrin's Global workforce study, competitive base pay is the most important factor that attracts UK workers to an ...
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Article
Government puts back maternity extension
The government has ruled out extending statutory maternity pay and maternity allowance to 52 weeks at the same time as introducing additional paternity leave and pay in April 2009. A statement by HMRC said that the government remains committed to extending statutory maternity pay and the maternity allowance by the ...
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Case Studies
Case study: Ashton Morton
When law firm Ashton Morton Slack rebranded in May 2005, it decided to look at introducing a new package of flexible benefits as part of a wider drive to help it improve staff performance, recruitment and retention.With a mixed culture of young staff, families and older workers it wanted to ...
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Article
First ruling on age discrimination laws
Employers should not take too much comfort from the ruling in favour of City law firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer (Freshfields) in Bloxham v Freshfields, the first major test of the new regulations on age discrimination which came into effect last October.The employment tribunal found that there had been potentially discriminatory ...
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Article
Pensions' tax affairs are forced online
HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has specified that certain documentation for registered pension schemes must now be submitted electronically, rather than in paper form.The documentation includes an application to register a pension scheme and registered pension scheme returns.For further information on what has to be filed electronically and how, visit: ...
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Article
National Grid Wireless adds life assurance to flex
National Grid Wireless is to bolster its flexible benefits scheme by incorporating life assurance from December.The perk was previously a standalone core benefit and provided staff with cover of four times their salary for dependants, should they die while employed at the company. Now, through the flexible benefits scheme, staff ...
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Case Studies
BT offers access to sharesave and share incentive plans
BT offers employees access to both sharesave and share incentive plans (Sips), with free share allocations that are tightly linked to company performance - based on customer satisfaction and earnings per share.Francis O'Mahony, shareholder services manager, explains: "We want to enable employees to build up a stake in the company ...
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Article
Abbey and Faber Maunsell take up health cash plans
Abbey and Faber Maunsell have unveiled healthcare cash plans for staff. The bank has introduced the perk as a voluntary benefit along with a credit card and a mortgage with preferential rates for staff. Faber Maunsell has also launched a cash plan along with a wine club as options under ...
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Case Studies
BHP Billiton's global share scheme has has a 30% take-up
Global shares at BHP BillitonThe scheme, which offers a free share for every share purchased as long as the stock is held for three years, has so far achieved a 30% take up. When launching the plan, the mining company wanted a scheme that would encourage staff engagement and align ...
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Article
Cadbury cuts driver admin
Cadbury Schweppes has outsourced the monitoring of its fleet's driver licences to Intelligent Data Systems (IDS) to cut administration and quickly identify high-risk drivers.Previously, the firm asked drivers to fill out driver licence forms and sent these to the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA). Now, IDS works with the ...
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Article
Absence hits workload
Almost two-thirds of staff (62%) believe that their workload has been significantly affected by a colleague being off sick, according to the LHF Corporate wellbeing survey. The research also shows that more than nine-out-of-ten employers (93%) feel that they can make a difference to employee health and wellbeing at work. ...