Global employee benefits

Employee benefits are the perks an employer provides beyond salary. These can include traditional core benefits like pensions, health insurance, life insurance, and critical illness cover.

And as employee expectations of benefits increase, employers are increasingly offering flexible benefits which allow employees to customise benefits and choose the benefits most relevant to their needs. For example, flexible benefits schemes let employees amend the level of cover on core benefits, add dependents, or take up voluntary benefits; employees typically pay for flexible benefits via salary sacrifice (whereas core benefits are paid for by the employer).

Popular flexible benefits include holiday purchase, life-stage benefits, green benefits like EVs, and allowances for wellbeing, learning or work-from-home setup.

Employee benefits are crucial for attracting, engaging and retaining talent, improving employee wellbeing and boosting productivity. According to our 2024 research, the primary reason for offering employee benefits is to retain employees and build loyalty, followed closely by enhancing productivity and profitability. 91% of HR and Reward professionals also believe that offering a comprehensive benefits package helps align employee values with company goals.

A global benefits platform is a centralised system that enables organisations to run employee benefits programmes, manage sign ups and engage employees in their benefits – anywhere in the world. It lets employees view all their available benefits, see the value of their total reward, and select the benefits most relevant to them. In countries with limited flexible benefits options, read-only benefits content helps employees understand the benefits their organisation provides.  

Employee benefits platforms like OneHub offer a consistent experience for employees, regardless of location. So, if an employee at a large global organisation like Salesforce, Snowflake or Ciena moves to a new country for work, they can log onto a familiar platform to quickly and easily understand and choose their employee benefits.

Global benefits technology helps organisations streamline employee benefits management, reduce HR benefits administration, and ensure consistency and compliance of employee benefits across regions.  

By implementing global benefits software, companies can communicate the value of benefits more effectively and provide employees with a modern, user-friendly experience. Only 18% of employees say their current benefits tech meets their expectations – so investing in benefits tech that can deliver an exceptional experience is essential for keeping pace with evolving employee needs. Learn more about building a business case for a global employee benefits platform in our guide to global benefits tech.

A successful employee benefits platform should: 

• Deliver a great user experience for global employees – employees expect their workplace technology to deliver the same exceptional experience they get from the apps they use in their personal lives 
• Empower employees to make informed decisions about their benefits 
• Engage a dispersed workforce, including remote or deskless employees 
• Offer personalised benefits experiences that treat employees as an ‘audience of one’ with targeted messages and content 
• Provide HR, reward and benefits teams with actionable data insights to improve their employee benefits strategy 
• Remove the admin burden for HR teams (by taking care of benefits reporting and providing employees with a specialised employee benefits support service) 
• Create a single hub that shows the value of everything you do for employees – across employee benefits, content, communications, policies, wellbeing, reward and recognition 

Forward-thinking organisations are increasingly using their benefits platform as a hub for culture and an every-day resource for employees to access support.  

Book a demo to see how OneHub can help you achieve all these outcomes.

A global benefits platform delivers significant ROI by reducing HR costs, improving compliance, and increasing employee engagement. For instance, global benefits technology can: 

• Save HR teams thousands of hours in administering benefits, freeing them up to focus on other initiatives 
• Decrease benefits-related support queries by 82% 
• Improve employee benefits engagement, increasing take-up by an average of 22% 
• Mitigate compliance risks and prevent overspend in insurance premiums 
• Help organisations realise tax savings (in some regions) 
• Save employees hours each year by making it easier to access and manage benefits

Ask these essential questions when assessing your employe benefits tech provider: 

1. How does the benefits platform address our specific organisational challenges? 
2. Does the platform meet rising employee expectations?  
3. How does it enable relevant and timely global communications?  
4. What level of support can we expect?  
5. What strategic insight can I get from the platform to improve our benefits strategy? 
6. How does the benefits platform scale globally to support our organisation’s growth? 
7. How flexible and configurable is the tech – and can it support local as well as global requirements? 
8. Does the benefits software integrate with the rest of our HR tech stack?  
9. Is 24/7 employee support included with the tech? 
10. Does it support access for employees in their local language?

Read the full guide

Flexibility is key to creating an attractive benefits package; this is the number one way employees say their benefits could be improved. By offering a diverse range of flexible and voluntary benefits, employers can cater to various employee needs – enhancing engagement and satisfaction.  

More organisations are looking to benefits allowances; 73% of organisations plan to introduce benefits allowances in the next 12 months to provide employees with more choice.

By aligning benefits with company values, employers can demonstrate their commitment to inclusivity and sustainability. A well-designed benefits platform ensures benefits are accessible to all employees, regardless of life stage or background – and offers the flexibility to meet their diverse needs.  

Organisations are increasingly using benefits tech to communicate the value of everything they do for their people, the environment and the wider community by consolidating messages and content on the benefits platform. And green and DEI focused benefits are growing in popularity; for example, more employers are starting to offer EVs, tree planting, menopause benefits, volunteering, and benefit allowances.

Each year, Benefex releases The Big Benefits Report. The report is informed by 2,000+ interviews with global employers and employees across four continents. Here are five key trends our 2024 report uncovered: 

1. The reasons organisations are investing in benefits are evolving – the top reason for investing in benefits is to retain employees and build loyalty; last year it was to enhance employee wellbeing.  
2. Beyond salary, the number one area where employee expectations have risen is workplace benefits – 59% of global employees say benefits are very important when evaluating a new employer.  
3. Many employers are now implementing benefits allowances to offer the ultimate benefits flexibility as employees demand more choice.  
4. Employers are becoming more sophisticated in their use of benefits data and analytics; 38% can now prove impact and ROI from benefits investment, up from 24% last year.  
5. Benefits tech adoption is set to grow significantly, with more than three quarters (78%) of organisations considering implementing a platform.