Context

The study starts from a hypothesis that healthier employees are likely to be more productive, and that that there is a link between financial and physical health. Health wellness benefits offered by employers should thus lead to healthier workforces. The study considered a wide range of benefits. Financial benefits ranged from retirement planning and debt counselling to providing wage advances and specific types of insurance – thus covering direct financial support as well as education.

The study

Prudential, a major health insurance provider, wanted to better understand the value of health wellness initiatives, including that of financial wellness initiatives. It involved an online survey in May 2019 of 2,000 full-time employed workers in the US who had access to workplace health wellness benefits. Results were weighted by age, race/ethnicity, gender, education and region. The survey continues Prudential’s Financial Wellness Census.

Key findings

• Employees tend to use health benefits that require less effort or commitment on their part.
• 76% of employees said their employer offered flu shots and 49% had taken up the offer in the last year. 60% or more of employers offered wellness challenges, health assessment and screening, mental health support and discounted or free gym or fitness membership.
• The health benefits employers offered tended to reflect what employees most wanted to use. These included healthy food in cafeterias and onsite gyms and fitness facilities. Healthy food and health screening do however tend to be wanted by employees who don’t have access to them.
• About a third of employees who didn’t have them wanted onsite clinics, dietitians and standing desks.
• Employees who are offered incentives are more likely to use health wellness benefits. 65% of users said they received incentives.
• Those who used benefits tended to hold their employer in higher regard, with 60% of users believing that their employer looked out for their financial interests, compared with 45% of non-users.
• Employees reported not using benefits for a variety of reasons, including not having time, already having the support they need, not wanting to spend extra money, or not finding them relevant to their needs.
• The benefits employees most wanted to be offered included identity theft protection (34%), emergency savings accounts (33%) and financial coaching (32%) and debt consolidation (31%). Only 16% wanted retirement planning tools despite 66% offering them. 36% reported having used them.
• Employees also reported that they were offered financial education sessions (35%), financial coaching (35%), digital advice and planning tools (32%) and debt counselling (26%).
• Most reported that employers offered no further incentives to use available benefits, or that they were not aware of any.
• 59% were somewhat or extremely satisfied with the range of benefits offered, while 25% were not.
• Those who were unlikely to use what was available had what they needed (24%) or didn’t find the offer suitable to their needs (23%), while 21% were concerned about office privacy.
• Workers who were not offered benefits tended to report more worries about financial matters than those who were. 46% of those without benefits (as opposed to 40% of those with benefits) were concerned about retirement savings, 44% (32%) about paying off debt, and 42% (32%) about not having emergency savings.
• More generally, 27% (18%) worried about their current finances and 28% (19%) about their financial future.
• Workers who are financially well by both objective and subjective measures are more likely to have access to workplace financial wellness benefits. Overall, those who are positive about their financial wellness were more likely to make use and approve of what was on offer.

Points to consider

• Overall, results are subject to a margin of error of two percentage points either way.
• The report is quite summary, with little detail of overall methodology or more detailed sources.
• The sponsor/reporter of the survey has an explicit interest in the area as a provider of benefits discussed.

• For employers looking at providing health wellness benefits and financial wellness programmes..

• The limitations outlined above in turn severely limit how far findings could be generalised.
• US employment benefits have a radically different context from the UK.

• The wider initiative reported may be more useful and particularly in a wider review of differing national contexts.