My employer did this, too! A colleague used it when she was a bone marrow donor.
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If done correctly, yes. I’ve heard of it done in a somewhat tone deaf manner. The company paid up to a certain amount towards tuition and encouraged people to finish degrees or seek further education, which is good, but then there was a particular department where the workers had communicated to their bosses that they were overworked and getting burnt out. Then a while later the managers would tell the workers that doing classes/seeking certifications/development would be a Good Thing that they should definitely do … except that would be outside of work hours. And no there will not be any more people hired or resources gotten to address the burn out issue.
From what I’ve heard several people are looking for new jobs.
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Free pint of ice cream a week. (This was when I worked in an ice cream factory. It was really good ice cream!)
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A frozen turkey at the end of the year, around the holidays. If the employee doesn’t want it, it is donated.
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I feel dumb for not remembering this one earlier:
Bring your dog to work!
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Not sure how many of these are just standard, but:
- Bike to work scheme where essentially you can get a free (rather nice) commuter bike if you stay at the company for 2-3 years after getting it.
- free private healthcare (UK so this isn’t necessary, but does give me access to therapy if I ever need it and really quick consultant appointments)
- Generous budget for “morale” activities with the team and the office. We’re going on a team trip to Amsterdam next month, and have some sort of team lunch/ office event most months. I think this is a really big one that keeps people working here in my experience, as people seem to actually be friends with people they work with far more than the average.
- 3/ yearly hackathons and “conferences” that basically involves feeding all of engineering for two days and just letting them make/ talk about whatever they think is interesting (which can be totally unrelated to work)
- Full pay for first 6 months of maternity leave.
- Training budget for attending conferences/ external training.
- Profit share bonus yearly
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Where I worked previously we got crazy staff discounts, some of the prices were 10% of what we wholesaled for. The down side was that they were all construction materials so needed someone to turn them into something and labour is expensive, and you also needed a construction project. I never needed to purchase anything it covered.
I’d be tempted to try and get part time work with them again if we were going to undertake any significant renovations.
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Current benefits:
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Flex schedule option. Sign up to work four ten hour days, an eight hour day with a 30 minute lunch instead if an hour (I can’t wait to switch to this one).
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Option to telework in case if inclement weather, option to telework one day out of your workweek on a regular basis.
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Infant in the workplace program. If the environment is an office (I work for my state’s government), most agencies allow you to bring your newborn with you to work until they’re 3-9 months old, depending on your agency.
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One personal day and one personal holiday of your choosing a year, treated like a paid vacation day. Expiration for using these are usually set six months apart, and both renew each year.
Previous benefit:
- 25-70% off of pet food. I worked at a small (but growing) holistic pet supply company, and something like 2/3 of our vendors opted into an employee purchase program which gave employees 70% off their pet food. Still got a 25% discount on brands that did not opt in. While I wouldn’t go back to working retail, it was amazing for me and my cats.
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At my previous workplace, everyone got off work from Christmas Eve until New Year’s Day and it didn’t count against our PTO. The unseen benefit of this was that no one was expected to do work so the majority didn’t.
I work at a university now that has a pretty good tuition benefit. I also get discounts around town, including money off my rent and free city bus travel with my employee ID.
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Things I’ve had (various places, shan’t mention any names)
10% base salary 401k / 403b match
Deferred payment to reduce taxable income
Winter shutdown (everyone got PTO between christmas and new years)
Full salary + paid tuition for a graduate degree(I wish I had been able to take advantage)
Free meals in the corporate cafe (excellent food too)
Performance based bonuses up to 75% base pay
Internet paid for
Cellphone paid for
Mileage reimbursement for just showing up to the office
Access to academic journals even when not in school
Health Insurance Premiums fully paid for ($10 copay for anything except hospitalization, $100 for hospital)
Stock
Up to 200% annual salary sign on bonuses
Relocation assistance (paid to have movers pack up all my stuff and ship & unpack at the otherside)
Free computer stuff (monitors, desktop computers, peripherals. They would just give us the old ones when we upgraded every 3 years)
++$$$ to HSA if we tracked out exercise (Up to $2400 a year)
Gyms at work (free to use)
Paid time to volunteer if we wore company apparel at the event
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I won’t repeat ones that other people have posted, but a fun one from retail: I worked in a chocolate shop and it was all-you-could-eat during your shift.
I later worked at a different chocolate shop where staff received $25 a month in free chocolate of their choice, and $100 of chocolate of their choice at Christmas.
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The benefits at my job are fine, but I’m commenting because we ARE a great benefit. Employers contract with us to offer free financial coaching to their employees. I love doing it and I love that it exists as a thing!
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One I haven’t seen: we have a give a day program. If you donate at least one day of salary to any non profit of your choice (you can write in literally any nonprofit or select one from United way) they will pay all admin fees, match 50% of your donation, and you get 1 extra day of vacation.
We get free materials that the company makes which can save $1000’s.
I just had a stay interview with my company and what I realized after all of the questions is I am staying at my company for the culture. The benefits are a huge perk but I don’t think I would stay or leave because of benefits.
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I don’t think I’ve seen this one mentioned yet is that sick time can be donated. Our sick time caps out at 160 hours and we accrue 2.5 hours per paycheck regardless of tenure. People who have a lot of sick time and are coming up on the cap can donate it to a coworker in need, for example if someone is going through cancer treatments (has happened twice that I know of) or is taking off time to care for their micro-premie baby. The donor’s sick time cannot drop below 80 hours so they can’t give away all of their sick time.
Also, I don’t remember if this has been mentioned yet, but charitable matching. My company doesn’t match just any charity, there’s an approved list. I have definitely been a squeaky wheel in the past to get my charities on the list (they were in line with the company values, they just hadn’t been officially reviewed and added).
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Working in several public libraries - no late fees on your materials! (You do still have to bring the things back and you have to pay if you lose or damage something. But if you’re 3 days late bringing back that DVD? No problem!)
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That reminded me - we have a volunteer day that we can take off each year. So on Friday I’m volunteering all day and will get paid without taking a vacation day.
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Oh yes! We can donate PTO in any amount. This is huge. I’ve donated the equivalent of a month’s pay each several times now.
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Remembered a silly/fun one that was specific to my last job/unlikely to be replicated or mean as much in other contexts:
I worked overseas on a US gov funded program. One of the standard program events was a fancy buffet dinner the night before Thanksgiving at one of the big hotels in Beijing. A colleague who was also a good friend was responsible for making the booking every year. I think the first year I was working on this program, the hotel that hosted it had a chocolate fountain at the dessert table. This was quite the hit with my kids! So every year before my friend made the booking I asked him to be sure to try to get the chocolate fountain. And most years he was able to. My DD still remembers/speaks fondly of it. I have a feeling if/when she has kids of her own and we are planning Thanksgiving a chocolate fountain will feature prominently!
Another nice “perk” I got right at the beginning of that job was an all expenses paid trip to Paris for a training I didn’t really need. My return flight was overbooked so according to EU rules I got a pretty hefty payout – I think it was $1200. I offered to give it to my employer, but my boss let me keep it.
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Won’t repeat the ones I’ve already seen in this thread, but a couple more:
- Ability to ‘thank’ coworkers with cash out of a general budget, no approval necessary just fill out the form
- Charity matches of both money and time so if I donate $ they’ll match $, but if I volunteer for 5 hours they’ll give the charity a per-hour cash donation too
- Outreach budget specifically to set up/run various volunteer activities
- Free hardware (this one does depend on what area you work in and is only really useful if you build your own computers)
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Oh I just remembered one I’m SUPER jealous about: an on-campus maker space, free to use once you go through orientation.
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