Personal Group

© Personal Assurance
Services Limited 2007
John Ormond House,
899 Silbury Boulevard,
Central Milton Keynes,
MK9 3XL
Tel: 01908 605000
Fax: 01908 698040

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Personal Group Seminar 23rd May 2007.

On the 23rd May Personal Group’s Benefits Seminar showcased its new Voluntary Income Protection Plan in partnership with Unum. Furthermore it highlighted the benefits and limitations of holiday pay funds. Guest speaker Colin Jellicoe Human Resource Director of Vinci explained how they successfully implemented a holiday pay fund.

The meeting commenced with Personal Group Director Mark Eaton who gave a historical account of how the last 10 years have been shaped in regards to compensation and benefits, and how Personal Group perceives the future of reward.

Personal Group has been involved in the employee benefit market for over 23 years and has subsequently witnessed the reward market develop from a massively paternalistic attitude of "We'll tell you what benefits you will get and what perks go with that" to some employers ending up like an extension of a satellite shopping channel.

Mark stated that whatever Benefits Package it decides on, an employer has to understand the most important thing is the way its employees feel about who they work for. This is what determines how motivated they feel about their jobs whether they are prepared to go that extra mile and strive for the company.

Basically employees want to be able to enjoy a reasonable standard of living and be paid sufficiently for their job. They want to feel secure in the knowledge that should any misfortune fall on themselves or their family, they will have provisions and a future. This is why pension, healthcare and income protection have to be fundamental in a benefits package, whether provided by the employer or made available through voluntary arrangements.

Deborah Botha from Unum explained how the new Voluntary Income Protection Plan works:

•	There is a 1 in 6 chance of being unable to work as a result of chronic illness, for the following reasons:

• The benefits of the scheme for employers were:
•	Easy to administer
•	Paid via company payroll
•	Staff retention
•	Staff attraction
•	No cost to the employer
•	NI contribution savings of up to 12.8%

• Deborah used the following case study to illustrate potential savings for the employer

Case Study
•	Company 5,000 Employees
•	Membership 2,500 Employees
•	Average Annual Premium £300 - Gross Monthly £25 Premium Using Salary Sacrifice - Net Monthly Premium £16.75 if Basic Rate Tax Payer, £14.75 if Higher Rate Tax Payer.
•	Total Annual Premium £750,000
•	Employers Annual NI Savings

• The benefits of the scheme for Employees are:
•	Financial security
•	No need to rely solely on State Incapacity Benefits
•	No need to dip into lifetime savings to support themselves during this time
•	Access to specialist medical advice and guidance which will increase the chance of a full return to work

Des Dunleavy from Flexible Remuneration Services spoke about Holiday Pay Funds:

• Benefits of the fund:
•	Employee NIC saving – this is given back to the employee (i.e. they get paid more for being on holiday!)
•	Employer NIC saving of around 1.2 – 1.7%
•	Provides better control and management of holidays

Colin Jellicoe from Vinci gave his account of the success of the scheme:

•	They already had this in place for some employees but have now made it available to 1857 monthly paid employees – only 2 employees chose to opt out.
•	The scheme took 6 weeks to implement from scratch – Vinci had no concrete holiday system in place
•	Only 1 Project Manager was needed to implement the scheme
•	Estimated Company savings amounted to £915,000
•	A holiday booking system was designed and implemented. The cost of this could come out of the savings accumulated through the fund
•	He praised Flexible Remuneration Servies for their support in making the process run smoothly.

Delegate feedback:

“Very helpful in developing my knowledge of new products and opportunities for offering employee benefits”

“Helped gain better insight of new developments and how they may be appropriate to my organisation”

“The products, case study and discussion worked extremely well and gave us the opportunity to clarify any queries we had regarding the scheme”

For more information on any of the above or forthcoming Personal Group events please contact

Jason Graves on