6 Incredible Tools to Boost Employee Retention and Satisfaction
Poor employee retention is bad for business. According to a 2019 Work Institute report, high turnover rates in the US resulted in a $617 billion loss.
This isn't surprising once you factor in all the recruiting, onboarding, and training costs that pile up with every employee that voluntarily leaves their job. This is not to mention the costs associated with lost productivity and disengaged employees who don't bring their A-game.
The good news is that employers can do a lot to establish a workplace culture that retains talent. What's more, getting your best employees to stay doesn't always mean offering the highest salaries in your industry. This is especially important for SMBs competing with larger organizations for top talent.
So, if poor employee retention is an epidemic, what's the cure? Here are six incredible employee retention tools that will encourage employees to quit quitting.
Payout cards
Payout cards are reloadable prepaid cards you can use to pay employees. They are increasingly becoming a popular alternative to paper checks or direct deposits. When payday arrives, all you have to do is load each employee's wages onto the card. From there, it's up to the employee whether they want to make payments online or get cash from ATMs because the card can do it all.
Payout cards are especially beneficial to employees without bank accounts. It allows them to still access their wages instantly. Overall, the fact that payout cards conveniently work like traditional debit cards is one of the many reasons workers prefer payout cards.
How do payout cards keep employees happy?
Payout cards are a fantastic way of improving the digital employee experience. Here are some ways a modernized payroll with payout cards can reduce employee turnover.
Removes financial stressors
Financial stress is one of the biggest reasons why employees leave. Payout cards can turn things around for your business by ensuring that employees encounter fewer financial hassles. For starters, paying employees via payout cards is faster than issuing paychecks. Employees can access wages as soon as you load them onto the cards.
They don't have to waste time cashing checks, and they can also avoid bank fees in the process. In addition, employees can avoid the headache of lost or stolen paychecks. Payroll cards can be used the same way as debit cards, so employees can shop anywhere anytime or access cash at ATMs.
The speed, convenience, and ease of use of payout cards boost financial happiness. This makes payout cards one of the most effective employee satisfaction and retention tools at the disposal of employers.
Offers unmatched flexibility
As an employer, you have many expectations that you set for your team. However, keep in mind that employees and candidates have their own expectations of you. You have to lead by example and be prepared to deliver for your employees.
Employees want companies that can provide flexibility and make an effort to meet their individual needs and preferences. A big part of this is offering flexible payment solutions like payout cards. The more payment methods you provide, the more you support the entire workforce and improve satisfaction with the company's work culture.
Keeps unbanked employees satisfied
According to a 2019 FDIC survey, roughly US 7.1 million households had no checking or savings account at a bank or credit union. Chances are you have employees who don't have bank accounts or employees who work on the road. While direct deposit is a popular payment solution, it's not viable for employees without bank accounts.
Similarly, paper checks are a traditional payment method that's labor-intensive and has a lot of limitations. Even if unbanked employees were to cash their checks, they still wouldn't be able to make online payments without a bank account or credit card. Fortunately, payout cards are an efficient, safe, and convenient way to satisfy employees and 1099 contractors.
Early pay for earned wages
Early pay for earned wages is fittingly referred to as on-demand pay because it allows your employees to access money as soon as they have worked for it. That means employees don't have to endure the agonizingly slow wait to payday when they find themselves in a financial pinch.
The most common types of payroll schedules are weekly, bi-weekly, semi-monthly, and monthly. However, there's always the chance that unexpected expenses come up between pay cycles, which can be stressful, especially for those who get paid less frequently.
Early pay for earned wages helps to address this. Employees can access their earned wages via payout cards or instant pay.
How does early access to wages keep employees engaged?
Early pay for earned wages has significant employee benefits. Ultimately, these employee benefits circle back to the employer in the form of high employee attraction, retention, satisfaction, and productivity.
Provides financial security and balance
The fact that most Americans live paycheck to paycheck is well-known. Most of the time, employees need extra help to survive to the next paycheck. Without early pay for earned wages, your employees may resort to predatory payday lenders with expensive interest rates and fees.
Others may be tempted to overdraft on their bank accounts, which comes with expensive overdraft fees. To avoid these scenarios, you can ensure that employees have fast access to their money by quickly loading their wages on their payout cards.
When you give workers early access to earned wages, you're providing a solid pathway to financial stability. It's also your pathway to better employee retention and satisfaction.
Creates an exceptional employee experience
The traditional payday can be disruptive to the work-life balance of your employees. That's because when life's unpredictability gets in the way, this can steal away peace of mind. Even if employees are dealing with a personal emergency, the challenges faced in this area will affect their work life.
Early pay for earned wages is a revolutionary concept that strengthens both the work and personal lives of employees. It shows that you're willing to support employees by offering this unique and highly flexible benefit that exceeds employee expectations. In essence, you're giving employees one more good reason to stay with your business for longer.
Keeps freelancers and contractors happy
You can also use early pay for earned wages to curry goodwill with freelancers and contractors that contract with your company. One of the most significant benefits that freelancers and contractors value is the freedom and flexibility to provide services according to their needs and services.
However, the problem is that most contractors don't always get the same benefits afforded to traditional employees. By paying your contractors via flexible and innovative payment arrangements, you end up with happy and satisfied contractors that deliver better work.
Instant pay
Instant pay is also called same-day pay, faster payment, or real-time payment. With instant payment, you can transfer money to employees' bank accounts, and they can access it within a few seconds, anytime, anywhere. One of the biggest benefits of instant pay to employees is it saves time by eliminating that trip to cash the paycheck.
This explains why direct deposit has become a common payment method in the US. While direct deposit payments are not always immediate, they are usually fast enough. How long a direct deposit takes generally depends on when the transfer process was initiated.
How does instant pay keep employees loyal?
Most employee retention tools and employee satisfaction tools are centered around fulfilling employees' payment needs. So, it makes sense that instant pay offers the following benefits.
Makes work less stressful
Personal finance issues are one of the top reasons employees are stressed in the workplace. In most instances, employees can hardly wait until they receive their wages. Getting their money within seconds or at least on the same payday empowers employees with financial wellness. In a nutshell, this results in a higher retention rate, increased candidate attraction power, and improved employee productivity.
Fulfills employees expectations
When employees join your company, they typically expect the job to come with a satisfactory number of perks. With the improvement in fintech, instant pay is becoming one of those perks that come standard with the job. So instant pay is one way to fulfill employee expectations, so they don't consider looking elsewhere.
Saves time and energy
Employees shouldn't have to work hard to get their money. After all, they worked hard and delivered their work on time. So, employees feel better knowing they can access their money as soon as they need it. In addition, instant play eliminates the need to spend extra energy collecting and cashing paychecks.
Reward incentives
Employee rewards can be monetary or non-monetary, and they are given to employees to recognize excellent work performance. Employee incentives can also be financial or non-monetary, and they are offered to motivate employees towards a specific goal.
Hence, reward incentives have a double effect on employees. The most common type of reward incentive is the end-of-year bonus or thirteenth paycheck. This is a reward paid to employees for hitting benchmarks throughout the year.
It can also incentivize employees to work harder in anticipation of future rewards. Other compensation benefits include physical gifts, gift certificates, reloadable gift cards, eVouchers, service awards, or prizes given at company virtual events.
How do reward incentives keep employees motivated?
Reward incentives are an exceptional employee retention tool that will help keep employee satisfaction levels through the roof. Here's how it works:
Keeps employees healthy and happy
Being recognized and appreciated is a fundamental psychological need. It fulfills a deeper need within employees when they know their hard work is being seen. Whether you're offering monetary or non-monetary incentives, the effort is something that employees can always appreciate.
You can take things one step further by improving employee wellness through wellness programs that cover things like wellness assessments and gym memberships. Such a holistic company culture improves employee engagement and attracts new talent.
Improves relationships between managers and employees
A big portion of employees that quit do so because they are unhappy with the management. That's because when employees don't receive positive feedback from managers, their work performance suffers. Reward incentives encourage management to offer constructive criticism and provide credit where credit is due. They ensure that employees feel valued by management and those around them.
Overall, this creates a workplace culture that's highly valued by employees. In turn, employees who value their job and workplace relationships have a sense of belonging that motivates them to stay with your company.
Motivates employees to work harder
Reward incentives are employee appreciation and recognition tools that motivate your team to work harder. When placed in such a work environment, employees are focused on enjoying their work and don’t even consider leaving. Instead, they are more focused on delivering quality work to keep more rewards and incentives coming.
To ensure that reward incentives are consistent, you should make it easier by providing a convenient platform for financial rewards. For instance, payout cards allow you to load a wide range of monetary reward incentives, including bonuses and raises. In addition, they're easily accessible to employees whether they are working remotely or in the office.
Crypto payments
Crypto payroll involves paying employees with any of the various electronic coins and tokens available through blockchain technology. It's not unheard of for employers to pay employees in Bitcoin or cryptocurrency.
Crypto payments for bonuses are especially common because there are generally no legal constraints involved. There are two ways to make crypto payments to employees. You can pay employees their wages using the normal currency and then convert some of the wages to a cryptocurrency of their choice.
Alternatively, you can make direct crypto payments into employees' wallets. While crypto payments are not a cut and dried process for businesses, they're one of the most innovative payment methods and employee satisfaction tools.
How do crypto payments keep employees effective?
Employers can now include crypto payments as part of the compensation benefits offered to employees. This forward-thinking move attracts top talent for several reasons.
It's fast and direct
We live in a world where digital payments have become widespread. This has led to high expectations when it comes to getting paid on time. For many employees, it seems that fast payments should be the norm as this goes a long way towards reducing financial stress.
Crypto payments are, therefore, mostly welcomed by employees because digital currency is received almost instantly. In addition, crypto transactions are direct because the money goes straight to the employee without passing through a bank account first.
These elements keep employees appreciative, which is crucial for a positive work culture. It shows that you're willing to add another convenient payment method to accommodate employees' needs.
It appeals to tech-savvy employees
Crypto payments are a way to keep up with the demands of a dynamic and digital-minded workforce. Cryptocurrency is especially appealing to young tech talent that understands the potential benefits of being paid in crypto. Investing in cryptocurrency has become a huge trend in recent years as the value of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies keep skyrocketing.
As such, offering to pay employee bonuses in crypto adds value to jobs and earns you a reputation as a cool futuristic business that's fun and interesting to work for. This helps you attract and retain top talent more easily.
It's inexpensive and decentralized
Crypto transactions don't require banks and other financial institutions to be middlemen. Instead, employees receive compensation through a peer-to-peer network. This can be a huge motivation for using crypto for employees without bank accounts or those who want to avoid bank fees and charges.
If your employees have shown an interest in getting paid in crypto, implementing crypto payments will help boost engagement and can be a huge incentive. When employees know they can influence work-related matters that affect them, they feel supported and become more effective and happy at work.
No waiting for reimbursement
It's pretty common for employees to incur out-of-pocket expenses during work missions. For instance, employees who are on business trips can use their own money to pay for a business dinner. Employees can also spend their money on supplies, tools, education, training, or other work-related expenses.
Employee reimbursement can be inconvenient since reimbursable costs are usually paid back on the next payday. However, there's a way to cut out the wait time for employees. By issuing employees a reloadable card specifically meant to cover business expenses, you can ensure they never have to wait for reimbursement.
How does not waiting for reimbursement keep employees satisfied?
There are many benefits that come with using reloadable payout cards instead of waiting to reimburse employees at a later date.
Higher employee satisfaction levels
When employees claim reimbursement, the process typically takes too long, which can lead to dissatisfaction. When employees are waiting for reimbursement, it's easy for them to feel disgruntled because they want their money back as quickly as possible. Maybe they need the money to visit their doctor or pay a crucial bill, so they will view you in a negative light since you're part of the problem.
However, making sure that employees don't have to pay upfront for office supplies or a business lunch leads to high employee satisfaction, compliance, motivation, and productivity.
Eliminates frustrations associated with seeking approval
Employee reimbursement requires employees to file expense reports which can be time-consuming, tedious, and frustrating. Reimbursement claims must be approved by management before employees can get their money back. The process may involve a lot of follow-ups, correspondence, and delays. All this is to say that employers are adding unnecessary work to their plates.
The worst thing that can happen is when employees discover they're not eligible for reimbursement. Since that's a surefire way to get employees upset, the best way to keep employees satisfied is not to make it financially harder for them to do their jobs.
Relieves financial burdens
Employee reimbursements can be harmful to employees. As mentioned, most employees are already finding it tricky to survive from paycheck to paycheck. So, when employees have to use their own personal resources to cover business expenses, this can quickly add to the financial stress they may already be experiencing.
As an employer that cares about how company processes are impacting employees, it's essential to eliminate employee reimbursement altogether. With preloaded payout cards that can be easily used to cover business expenses, you avoid contributing to employees' financial hardships.
Use Juice Banking And Retain Great Employees
What if you could get one tool that would allow you to drive employee retention and satisfaction on multiple fronts? The good news is it's not wishful thinking, thanks to Juice Payout Cards.
Do you have unbanked employees, or do you want to give employees access to additional payment methods? Juice Payout Cards are a top option because employees don't need a bank account. In addition, they're an innovative alternative to paychecks and direct deposits.
Do you want to give employees early access to their earned wages? Simply load the wages onto the payout cards at any point of the pay cycle. Your employees will be able to access the money instantly.
How about when you want to issue bonuses or financial rewards to show how much you appreciate your employees' hard work? All you have to do is reload the payout cards and watch employees glow with satisfaction.
Also, have you noticed how your employees hate waiting to get reimbursed for company expenses they covered? You can give them a break with reloadable cards to cover future business expenses.
Remember improving employee retention and satisfaction is about fulfilling your employees' needs. The point is that employees need to get paid on time and the right way. With the solutions that Juice Banking provides, you can tick many boxes all at once and kill four or more birds with one stone.
Get started with Juice Banking and keep quit rates low with flexible digital payment solutions that satisfy employees.
