All Employee Benefits articles in Web Issue – Page 229
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Article
Parliamentary debate sparks new calls to raise sharesave savings limit
A parliamentary debate on saving has sparked renewed calls for the monthly sharesave savings limit to be raised from £250 to £400 to help employees save more.In the debate, Treasury finance secretary Ian Pearson MP said that a third of the two million employees currently saving into a sharesave scheme ...
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Article
Civil servants expected to claim pension for 29 years
Civil servants are expected to claim their pensions for two extra years, with the average 40-year-old male now expected to enjoy 29 years of retirement benefits when he reaches 60.The Civil Superannuation Resource Accounts for 2007/8 reveal that male life expectancy has remained steady for women, but men in the ...
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Article
Business group Employers for Carers launched
Employers for Carers, a new government-backed business group, has been launched to help employers support carers in the workplace.Membership to the group, which provides employers with practical advice and support on training, legal changes and policies such as flexible working, ranges from £500 to £2,000 a year depending on an ...
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Article
BBC managers face pay freeze and bonus cut
The BBC has axed pay increases and bonuses for more than 400 senior staff until after 2010 in a cost-cutting exercise, partly triggered by the recession.BBC director general, Mark Thompson, sent an email to staff this morning detailing proposals to cut bonuses and freeze wage increases as part of move ...
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Article
Debi O'Donovan, editorial director of Employee Benefits: Why salary sacrifice is becoming so widespread
Salary sacrifice schemes are becoming ever more popular among employers striving to cut benefits costs in the current recession [Sub - Note: by January the UK should officially be in recession, but you can change this to economic downturn if you prefer]. And this popularity received a further boost with ...
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Article
Abbey and Age Concern executives share leadership skills
Abbey and Age Concern have teamed up on a mentoring programme that allows employees from the charity to learn skills from the bank's key staff.The programme is open to Abbey's London-based senior executives, who will share their experience of managing change following the Santander Group acquisition in 2004. It follows ...
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Article
Pension Protection Fund appoints Alan Rubenstein as chief executive
The Pension Protection Fund (PPF) has appointed Alan Rubenstein as its new chief executive, with effect from 1 April.He will take over from departing chief executive Partha Dasgupta, who will remain at the PPF in an advisory role until his contract ends in June.Rubenstein, who joins the PPF from his ...
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Article
Employers in the dark over cost of reward
Employers are in the dark about the cost of their reward spend, according to new research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD).Its Annual Reward Management Survey found that 46% of employers are not aware of their total remuneration spend, including employee benefits, base pay, variable pay and ...
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Article
Tax-free tobacco perk for USA-based foreign diplomats
Foreign diplomats based in the USA can now enjoy a perk that is likely to leave health and wellbeing devotes fuming – tax-free tobacco.It follows a State Department ruling to exempt cigars, cigarette and pipe tobacco from federal, state or local tax for diplomats posted in the USA.However, this is ...
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Article
Buyer's guide to vehicle leasing (February 2009)
Vehicle leasing offers an attractive way of cutting costs and benefiting from tax breaks, says Amanda WilkinsonIn this economic climate, populating a fleet with leased vehicles will be a more attractive option than buying them outright for many organisations.For employers trying to control costs, leasing is relatively risk free because ...
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Case Studies
Case Study: Abbey
As a financial institution, Abbey regards financial education as being paramount to the wellbeing of its 16,000 employees, particularly during the current economic climate.It is planning to launch a workplace financial education programme to help staff cope with the credit crunch, following on from an initiative built around its sharesave ...
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Article
Abbey and Cancer Research UK launch financial education
Abbey and Cancer Research UK have launched financial education programmes to help employees manage their money during the recession.Cancer Research UK's scheme will first roll out its initiative to a group of 60 employees this month and has scheduled further sessions to take place throughout the year. The charity will ...
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Article
Educating staff about annuities
Employers can help staff choose their annuities but there are risks in doing too much, says Nicola SullivanEmployers that have gone to great lengths to promote the value of saving into occupational pensions to their staff may also be keen to ensure employees select the right annuities. On reaching retirement, ...
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Article
Active Risk Management launches electronic driver permit
Active Risk Management (ARM) has launched an electronic driver permit, which allows fleet managers to check if their employees are eligible to drive on company business.The online permit creates an auditable record for each driver with details of risk assessments, driver training and licence checks, which can be updated over ...
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Article
Interview with Annamaria Lusardi, professor of economics at Dartmouth College
Providing financial education to staff can indirectly impact performance, Annamaria Lusardi, professor of economics at Dartmouth College, tells Tom WashingtonFor many employees, making the right decisions when it comes to their personal finances, particularly in terms of savings and investments, is a tough task. This is often due to a ...
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Article
Security breach on Busy Bees' website
Busy Bees has apologised to clients after some of its customers' confidential data was left exposed to other users during an upgrade to its website.The childcare voucher provider said the data was exposed to other users overnight on 11 February but affected parts of the site were taken down the ...
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Analysis
Providing benefits during maternity leave
Employers must quickly get to grips with the new maternity leave rights, says Victoria FurnessThe government's drive to be seen as more family-friendly in recent years - with the introduction of policies such as extended maternity leave - is having an unwanted effect: life has got more complicated for employers ...
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Article
ING Car Lease sees rise in rentals
Fleet leasing company ING Car Lease has seen a significant rise in the number of companies using rental vehicles as a key part of their fleet management strategy. In the last year alone the fleet specialist has seen the volume of rentals it handles for both public and private sector ...
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Article
Medicash reviews car and travel policies as part of new carbon neutral status
Liverpool based health cash plan provider Medicash has announced that it has achieved carbon neutral status.In addition to carbon offsetting Medicash is aiming to reduce its carbon footprint by a further 10% over the coming year.†To help achieve this goal the company is limiting its company car policy to vehicles ...
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Article
Government clarifies car tax relief
The government has published a technical note that explains in detail how changes to the capital allowance regime for business fleets will take effect as part of an HM Treasury consultation on business fleet tax reforms, which closes on 27 February.The document, Modernising tax relief for business expenditure on cars: ...