How Perkbox is helping people combat rising costs

Here at Perkbox, we did our own survey of UK workers recently, and 73% said they expected their employer to support them with the rising cost of living. 

We also speak with a lot of HR professionals every day, and the number one question we get asked is: How can I support my employees during the economic downturn?

This isn’t an issue that’s going away any time soon either. Basic food costs have increased massively — in the UK, they’re 30% more than they were two years ago. Businesses themselves are stretched so pay rises aren’t always an option either. It means being creative is the name of the game.

As a global rewards and benefits platform, we work with thousands of businesses, to help them help their people. Here are some of the ways we try and help.

Everyday savings

Our tool to help employees save money all year round was always popular, but this has gone up a notch over the last 18 months. After all, the most important thing you can do for employees right now is help them with day-to-day expenses.

With over 9,000 deals and discounts on our platform, people are able to save on things like their grocery shopping and household items — as well as less frequent purchases such as holidays. There’s something to suit everybody’s individual needs and lifestyles. 

This leads to a wider point about the cost of living crisis. While you naturally want to help your people financially, it’s also important to empower them. In other words, let them take control of their personal situation. 

It can be tempting to give them a specific voucher to a specific grocery store — but what if they don’t shop there? What if they’re fine with groceries but are struggling to save up for a tech gadget to gift for Christmas? That’s why the choice element is key.

Boosted Super Savings

Every month, we’re running Super Saver Week. This is where we boost the discount employees get on selected perks — with a specific focus on ones which’ll help them during these tough times. 

We know things like groceries and fuel are core to pretty much every household budget, so we’ve prioritised these deals. We also know that for a lot of people, the second half of the month can be tough as they look to get through to payday — so we’ll be running these boosted deals on the third week of every month.

Mental wellbeing support

While we’ve focused a lot on financial savings here, we haven’t forgotten the other aspects of wellbeing either. 

During the pandemic, our wellbeing product became more sought after. And with the cost of living crisis having a negative impact on people’s mental health, this hasn’t changed. 

Something we’ve always been conscious of is that wellbeing is a very personal thing. Everybody has their own individual goals and challenges. A one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work — companies need to find a way to cater for everybody’s needs.

Our platform lets companies give their employees a suite of tools to use as and when they need. These include:

• Free or discounted access to gym and yoga sessions
• Online workout videos
• Counselling sessions
• Mindfulness apps
• Wellbeing guides

Enhanced rewarding options

We know businesses are increasingly looking for creative ways to reward people for good work — especially as we get towards the end of the year. It’s not easy, when you consider monetary rewards aren’t always an option for businesses that are stretched.

But our survey of over 2,000 employees found that being unable to enjoy the moments that matter is having an impact on people’s mental health. Things which we might class as “nice-to-haves”  —  going to the pub or cinema, for example —  are being reduced. These are more valuable than you might think, with over a third of people saying they missed these and 28% saying their mental health has worsened as a result.

It’s why our Reward offering works so well. Employers can gift their teams points which they can then spend on a reward of their choosing. Not only does this link in with the earlier point around choice, but it also removes the admin hassle of manually sourcing rewards for employers.

The key takeaway

We have a couple of really important rules at Perkbox.

Firstly, we don’t sell — we solve. And the only way we know what to solve is by putting the customer at the centre. One of our core values is Curiosity, and that isn’t just about listening to Ted Talks and reading books. It’s about finding out what problems employers are facing and trying to solve it.

That leads to the other really important rule — the most important conversations we have are the ones with our customers (both current and potential). Their opinions matter more than anyone’s.

It’s clear that economic uncertainty is the biggest challenge facing businesses today, and it feeds into pretty much all the other problems that can crop up — such as disengagement, productivity and poor retention.

We’re not a magic bullet which fixes everything. But we absolutely play a part in one of the most important challenges faced by HR teams, and it’s something we’ll continue to try and help them with.