Retail chain Asda has launched a financial wellbeing and flexible salary scheme for its more than 145,000 employees across its 600-plus store locations.
Asda signed up to financial wellbeing app Wagestream, in order to help employees keep track of their earnings and outgoings in real time, and organise their finances more effectively.
The app shows staff how much they have earned throughout the pay period, and provides access with flexible pay; users can access up to 50% of their real-time earned salary whenever they choose to.
The Wagestream app can also be connected to employees’ bank accounts, allowing access to their bank balance and outgoings in order to provide greater visibility and budget control.
Employees can also use the app to set aside money automatically into a savings pot. In addition, each month Asda employees using this feature will be entered into a prize draw, with a chance of doubling their savings pot, in order to encourage staff to save, and to do so at higher levels.
The app also comprises tools to help improve financial education, including a benefits entitlement calculator and a financial wellbeing quiz, which benchmarks progresses and outlines areas employees can improve their financial health.
Effective from 2 April, Asda also increased pay for its hourly-paid retail staff by 10%, from £10.10 to £11. From 2 July, this will rise further to £11.11, as part of a £141m investment in boosting hourly pay rates.
Asda also provides staff with health insurance, performance-related bonuses, a save as you earn (SAYE) scheme, a hybrid working model for head office staff, childcare vouchers, employee discounts, and car allowances.
Hayley Tatum, chief people and corporate affairs officer at Asda, said: “We understand that from time to time our colleagues may need a bit more financial help, something which would be made worse by the current cost of living crisis.
“We are always looking at ways we can help and giving our colleagues flexible access to their pay, alongside a range of support and guidance through the Wagestream App could prove vital in giving them financial peace of mind as well as their mental wellbeing.”
Asda employees have therefore joined the approximately two million people with acess to the Wagestream app via their employer, globally. Wagestream operates on a social charter, through which it pledged that its services would measurably improve the financial wellbeing of people in work.
Emily Trant, head of impact and inclusion at Wagestream, said: “The most recent State of Financial Wellbeing index found that record numbers of workers are willing to move jobs if offered better financial support.
“As one of the UK’s biggest flexible pay employers, with a whole range of tools and services to support financial wellbeing, Asda will improve the lives of existing team members and strengthens its position as a retail employer of choice.”
Wagestream’s State of Financial Wellbeing report found that 24% of UK employees worried about money every day, a yearly increase of 8%, while 50% wanted help with their savings.
