Benefits/perks of your job

average hero

I work in HR and I have found myself attracted to the field of Pay and Reward. With some economies growing and some stagnating, organisations are all over the place with the benefits and perks that they offer both in the public and private sector.

In my company, I get decent employer pension contributions (coupled with life assurance), very small bonus and they are paying for a post graduate qualification for me. Not bad, but not what a lot of the tech companies of the world are offering.

What benefits/perks are offered in your company/organisation/workplace?

RWCNT

Decent pension and private health insurance. And a great big box of biscuits in the middle of the office.

The odd time we get a dinner bought for us as well.

LightsStillOn

Free tap water

SEPT 23 1989

Its a sunny Friday afternoon and its nearly quittin' time

josip

Totally flexible hours.
Sometimes I get paid.

smash

Where's my popcorn while I wait for Aengus...

jimgoose

Elvis costumes, encrusted with real diamonds, thankyihverrahmuchthankyuh. Also, Komodo Dragons on a leash. The standard Gold Key to the Kludgie, behind the secret door in which is a very special room packed to the rafters with hoors and rather decent Courvoisier. Riches and power beyond the wildest imaginings of avarice, and all at the very special, once-off, never-to-be-repeated cost of your soul. Put your trousers back on, I said "soul"!!

Ken.

Mod-Moved to Work & jobs. Please read the local charter before posting.

MarcoAntonio23

Peace & quiet with no interruptions, I'm a mortician

I will get a one month sabbatical every four years.

Not sure how it will work though.

Mrs OBumble

TaxSaver tickets

Bicycle to work scheme.

The employer is willing to administer pension and health insurance, and arranges regular site visits from the representative of the companies they deal with. (I have better deals on both by dealing directly with outside providers).

Refrigerators to keep personal food in while in the office.

Free sugar, boiling water and filtered cold water water. (Kidding not - tea and coffee are not free, but the water is).

The opportunity to contributed to a Sports and Social club, and access its benefits - I have a feeling that the time to administer S&S events is also paid for by the company, too.

thegreatgonzo

Discount on vet meds, procedures and pet food. And an endless supply of chocolate from grateful clients.

alroley

On special occasions like birthdays and Christmas time there's sometimes cake and/or chocolate.

Laura_A

Health Insurance, Pension, Life Assurance, Pizza one Friday a Month, cake a different friday each month for Birthdays.. Free tea/coffee etc, fridges to store food, flexibleish hours, free lunches out a couple of times a year... Summer, Christmas (open bar) and halloween parties, subsidized sports & social club, Free health check in the office once a year, charity events sponsored/organised by the company, tax saver tickets...

Technocentral

LightsStillOn wrote:

Free tap water

Filtered I hope?

OldMrBrennan83

This post has been deleted.

eviltwin

Very flexible and family friendly which is vital to me. I work with an amazing group of people who are like family to me. Lots of free stuff like yoga, mindfulness etc laid on for us. Great social life for those who want it. Lots of free food.

andekwarhola

Pension contributions, healthcare for my family and performance bonus. Also really flexible to hours which is a godsend.

2Mad2BeMad

39 hour work week
No work on weekends or bank holidays.
Half day fridays
Free tea , coffee and use of microwave toaster and fridge.
3 bonuses a year
Can take holidays whenever no need to see if it overlaps with anyone else.
Salary paid. None of this ph pay.
Never expected to work ot but we do the odd time just because it's a good company.
And finally the most important part, the bosses are absolutely sound. Couldn't ask for better bosses, their brothers and they just get on with everyone.

Flatzie_poo

Laura_A wrote: »

Health Insurance, Pension, Life Assurance, Pizza one Friday a Month, cake a different friday each month for Birthdays.. Free tea/coffee etc, fridges to store food, flexibleish hours, free lunches out a couple of times a year... Summer, Christmas (open bar) and halloween parties, subsidized sports & social club, Free health check in the office once a year, charity events sponsored/organised by the company, tax saver tickets...

Can I PM you my CV?

hairyslug

as long as i get what needs to be done I can do what i like, like being on boards.

We can go to the shop and when we come back we then tell our boss we are going on lunch.

We got a free breakfast today

TrustedApple

Health insurance, tax saver bus ticket, endless amount of nespresso and hot chocolate, social nights out every 2 months, take aways paid for on bank holidays, pizza every now and then. Pension, life insurance.

Great place to work.

rabwaygal

Thankfully I dont have to have sleep ins or come home too early anymore:)

Also, I get to work from home at the weekends for free

On a serious note perks are health care, pension, half decent wage, easter egg at easter and a bonus during the year.

livedadream

Ive worked in one of those Tech companies-

car to work, sleep pods, free food, gym on site, dry cleaning, sabbaticals, bonuses, 30 days holiday a year not including BH's, paid bereavement leave, paid mat, parental and paternity leave before it was cool, pensions, healthcare, tuition assistance for kids, eduction allowance for upskillsing, etc etc the places with the best perks are usually the places you work the hardest. the perks are there to keep you onsite.

ive also worked places where we had to buy our own toilet roll...

syklops

Free lunch on friday. Free coke/7up fanta

Get to watch porn in work every so often. Not sure if thats the sort of perk you meant.

Yourmama

pension, health insurance for family, car insurance and home insurance contributions. lunch out twice a year and a open bar party twice a year, work phone for personal use. company shares at discount. further education If it's in line with my job. bike to work and tax saver tickets as well but this is not a perk really, every employer can do it.

free water, tea, coffee, fridge, microwave and subsidised canteen

Dr conrad murray

39 hour work week finish 3.30 on a friday they will arrange meeting with pension/health insurance providers.summer barbecue and christmas party every year.hot water for tea/coffee,microwave, toaster,and fridgefreezer provided also vending machines. 5mins drive from home!

galah

Free lunch (yes, really. Every day. Decent food), bonus, healthcare, working from home, flexitime, pension (with very good employer contribution), emploee assistance, life insurance, sports n social, xmas party, free tea n coffee etc, company phone, bike to work or commuter tickets, various provider days ( healthcare, bank, insurance etc), onsite massage service, fully paid maternity leave, option to buy extra annual leave (so you'd have 32 days in a year), soft skill courses and other training as required, huge online learning programmes, shares

I'm sure there's more...:)

Hollister11

livedadream wrote: »

Ive worked in one of those Tech companies-

car to work, sleep pods, free food, gym on site, dry cleaning, sabbaticals, bonuses, 30 days holiday a year not including BH's, paid bereavement leave, paid mat, parental and paternity leave before it was cool, pensions, healthcare, tuition assistance for kids, eduction allowance for upskillsing, etc etc the places with the best perks are usually the places you work the hardest. the perks are there to keep you onsite.

ive also worked places where we had to buy our own toilet roll...

You work in Google, Or Facebook

mcennis

Bottled water, tea / coffee and half price bill pay with vodafone but only on one package that doesn't appeal to me

industrialhorse

syklops wrote: »

Free lunch on friday. Free coke/7up fanta

Get to watch porn in work every so often. Not sure if thats the sort of perk you meant.

Please divulge full details through PM!

syklops

industrialhorse wrote: »

Please divulge full details through PM!

I do malware analysis of websites, now and again the site I have to analyse is.. ahem adult in nature.

Graham

syklops wrote: »

I do malware analysis of websites, now and again the site I have to analise is.. ahem adult in nature.

Either my spelling is wrong or you've been doing too much of that type of analysis.

syklops

Graham wrote: »

Either my spelling is wrong or you've been doing too much of that type of analysis.

Is it a y is it a z? Your spelling is grand, mine is a bit off.

DoozerT6

I feel the biggest one in my department is the ability to take full or half days off at very short notice if they are needed. I know of other places where staff can't even get a couple of hours off with plenty of notice to attend for medical tests. I could technically go in tomorrow morning and ask for a half day that afternoon if I needed it for some reason (sunbathing wouldn't count however!), and be pretty sure I'd get it as long as all the important work-y bits were done. Little things like that shouldn't be underestimated - being easily able to take a half day for a parent-teacher meeting, dentists appointment, or a flexi day for something as simple as a day out with your family mid-week are great perks. While I actually don't like my job very much, I am cognisant of the fact that I could land my dream job tomorrow and have to give six weeks notice if I needed a half-day off for something - with no guarantee I'll actually be able to take it when the time comes.

hardCopy

VHI, Car, Laptop, Mobile, Death in Service Benefit. Also get funding for external training where it's likely to benefit my performance.

_Kaiser_

Free tea/coffee/water (as well as the paid "premium" options), fridges/microwave, decent canteen, onsite parking, 25 days holidays (I think - I always end up with 5+ days left anyway), plus the usual pension/healthcare options. I wouldn't class the laptop and phone as a perk, more a requirement

The ability to work remotely/from home and flexible hours is probably my biggest one. Without it I wouldn't have been able to avoid pay the now ridiculous rents back in Dublin and be able to better balance my work/personal life.
As such I set my own schedule and can take time off with zero notice if needed - but the flip side is that with a global (IT) team to manage and the head of the department, my days are usually 12+ hours long and even when I'm off people will still contact/email me.

Overall though I think it's worth it for the ability to run things as I see fit and I don't abuse the freedoms as I enjoy my job and have a very good team working for me (who I see it as my job to support as much as lead) which definitely makes my job easier as we all buy in to what we're trying to achieve with minimal friction or problems. I have direct engagement with my peers and the leadership team and it's a very informal/supportive structure. Given some of the threads in the Work Issues forum for example that's a definite benefit/perk too

noel100

Contribute 5% of my salary employer gives 7.5% topup for pension. Total 12.5% contributions a year.
Full family laya health-care
Company did well last year 15% bonus
In 2 parts 7% 8% June & December.
Mobile & laptop need for the job
Car allowance need for the job
23days off a year as work a condensed work week can equal 6-7weeks off. Still doesn't stop you from becoming exhausted......

Free tea and coffee and food, pension my husband work gets a basket of fruit a few times a week and a half day on Friday and four day bank holiday weekend. one of my sister has one of those jobs with all the perks, pension, health insurance, bonus, paid for part time education with study leave, lunch out in fancy restaurants free bar at Christmas. I wonder why is it some jobs have so many extras and some don't.

Not providing free tea coffee and milk has got to be the ultimate in meanness.

jobless

HealthCare, Pension Top up, 24 days hols but the main one being flexible work arrangements....i can work from home half the week which means i get a break from the m50 and can take time off at short notice...
I could earn more elsewhere but the extra earned wouldnt be worth giving up the flexible work arrangement yet.

syklops

mariaalice wrote: »

I wonder why is it some jobs have so many extras and some don't.

Because some people are really tight and some people aren't.

syklops

syklops wrote: »

Because some people are really tight and some people aren't.

There might be an element of that, but it tends to be high end finance/insurance/IT/Legal that has the very generous extras then you get a middle layer with the good extras multinationals and the middle layer in finance or professional services. Every thing else seems to be very variable.

syklops

mariaalice wrote: »

There might be an element of that, but it tends to be high end finance/insurance/IT/Legal that has the very generous extras then you get a middle layer with the good extras multinationals and the middle layer in finance or professional services. Every thing else seems to be very variable.

I suppose its because of the value the employer places on the employee. High end IT engineer on 65k a year, needs a 2k laptop another 2k of hardware, another 2k of software, it probably cost the company 7-8k to find the right person and maybe they lost 7-8k a month while they were looking for the candidate due to lost productivity.

On the backdrop of those sorts of expenses, the benefits package per employee is a tiny drop in the ocean.

In other companies where you don't get top of the line hardware, choice of software suite etc, I have found the benefits package is quite smaller.

And in the one place I worked where I had to provide my own laptop and scavenged the other hardware I needed out of a skip, the benefits were free tea, coffee and filtered water and I could use the fridge/microwave for free.

Edit: I did work in one place where the pay was terrible but the perks were pretty good because the CFO wrote all the perks off against tax in a way he couldn't do with just increasing our salaries. I never understood the ins and outs, but I suppose if you are knowledgeable in tax law you can "cook the books" a bit in such a way that additional perks don't cost the company very much at all.

ongarboy

In my last job I had

Defined benefit pension
Free Health Care
Work from home option via remote dial in.
Taxsaver ticket
Bike to work scheme
Filtered Water
Onsite gym
discounts for various retailers that the company had partnership arrangements with.
Free coffee and tea from machine
Bonus (discretionary but performance linked)
Numerous free Work/Life balance Wellbeing type courses/lunchtime sessions etc
Salaries were among the upper level averages in our industry
27 days annual leave

All very well...but the morale in most departments in our company was awful and there was massive staff turnover. I left also. I'd have sacrificed most of the perks above for a happier and more supportive workplace where you weren't drained every evening and they didn't have a "live to work" culture......

Digs

VHI cover for myself and my family
5% pension contribution
Life Assurance
23 days annual leave
Bi-annual bonus @ 4%
Maternity pay top up
Payment for relevant study programmes and study/exam leave
€500 All for one voucher at Christmas
Discounts on various hotels
Frequent coffee rounds and lunches
Regular staff nights out with full bar and meal with taxis laid on
Tax Saver tickets
Bike to work scheme
City centre parking in various locations.

Looks good on paper, still run out the door every evening.

jobless

ongarboy wrote: »

In my last job I had

Defined benefit pension
Free Health Care
Work from home option via remote dial in.
Taxsaver ticket
Bike to work scheme
Filtered Water
Onsite gym
discounts for various retailers that the company had partnership arrangements with.
Free coffee and tea from machine
Bonus (discretionary but performance linked)
Numerous free Work/Life balance Wellbeing type courses/lunchtime sessions etc
Salaries were among the upper level averages in our industry
27 days annual leave

All very well...but the morale in most departments in our company was awful and there was massive staff turnover. I left also. I'd have sacrificed most of the perks above for a happier and more supportive workplace where you weren't drained every evening and they didn't have a "live to work" culture......

Nice perks but as you say, no point having them if you are miserable in your job.... they probably attract many people though

syklops

ongarboy wrote: »

In my last job I had

Defined benefit pension
Free Health Care
Work from home option via remote dial in.
Taxsaver ticket
Bike to work scheme
Filtered Water
Onsite gym
discounts for various retailers that the company had partnership arrangements with.
Free coffee and tea from machine
Bonus (discretionary but performance linked)
Numerous free Work/Life balance Wellbeing type courses/lunchtime sessions etc
Salaries were among the upper level averages in our industry
27 days annual leave

All very well...but the morale in most departments in our company was awful and there was massive staff turnover. I left also. I'd have sacrificed most of the perks above for a happier and more supportive workplace where you weren't drained every evening and they didn't have a "live to work" culture......

Free tea from a machine isn't a perk.

Utah

Defined benefit pension
Healthcare
Dental
Nespresso & tea
Free fruit
Free parking
All the tax savers and bike scheme etc
Laptop
Flexi hours
25 days holidays with options to purchase more
Finish early on Fridays
Christmas and summer parties - all free bars
15% bonus

It's no tech firm but it's easy going and there's no staying late.
Once I stayed in til 6pm to do some extra work and I was the last in the office!!

livedadream

Utah wrote: »

25 days holidays with options to purchase more

purchase more? this is really interesting to me, how does it work?

ongarboy

syklops wrote: »

Free tea from a machine isn't a perk.

Ha ha agreed! The coffee was worse but oddly enough it used to spit out this hot chocolate that was strangely quite nice!!!! Also, there was an onsite barista coffee counter where they made better americanos than any of the many coffee shops nearby for just €2.

Utah

livedadream wrote: »

purchase more? this is really interesting to me, how does it work?

It's a flexi benefit scheme.
You get a balance for your benefits, so depending on your level of seniority, the larger or smaller the balance. The entry level balance is enough to cover the standard healthcare package - which is a great package, but it could be downgraded to a basic healthcare package and that would cost less, this would give you a bit of extra cash to buy a holiday and a holiday cost is based on your level again.
Senior management would get a big balance, so they can upgrade their healthcare to the best packages, they could buy more holidays and there's a few other things that can be bought.