Financial wellbeing at PHA

Chris Smith

Employee wellbeing is extremely important to us here at The PHA Group. That is why we have a dedicated, employee-run, wellness team who regularly organise talks and activities throughout the year aiming to help support and improve our overall wellbeing.

One aspect of wellbeing that is often overlooked is the concept of financial wellbeing. The start of a new year for many brings with it the same worries and concerns about our personal finances. 77% of UK employees say that money worries impact them at work (People Management 2019). With personal finance worries shown to exacerbate mental health problems, it is clear to see that this is an issue that needs to be tackled.

That is why, starting in January, we teamed up with the financial planning company Browndog to deliver a series of presentations on financial wellbeing and personal finance.

The first session run by Jessamy Walker, started by exploring the concept of financial wellbeing. It was explained that financial wellbeing is the sense and security that a person feels with regards to their personal finances. Do you have enough money to meet your needs? Do you feel like you have full control over your day-to-day finances? Do you have the financial freedom to make choices that allow you to enjoy life? Your answer to these questions will determine the state of your financial wellbeing.

Jessamy then led PHA through a helpful and detailed presentation on some budgeting and quick-win saving tips. This covered everything from credit cards, loans and how to budget from month to month. It was fascinating to see how just a few changes in habits and a little bit of basic financial knowledge can have such a significant impact on improving our overall financial wellbeing.

Towards the end of the session, there was time our employees to ask their burning questions. Many took this opportunity to ask about pensions, a particular topic that causes a lot of confusion. According to the latest research from Hargreaves Lansdown 70% of young people do not understand their pension, so we know this is a hot topic and one we have dedicated a session to in the coming weeks. We also have three more upcoming session in March, April and June.

Jessamy was able to provide answers to these questions in a way which brought a lot of clarity to the  often confusing topic of personal finance . She provided us with some useful knowledge and practical steps to improve our overall financial wellbeing. We look forward to welcoming her back for the next presentation in March.

Here at The PHA group we take the topic of wellbeing very seriously, as well as arranging these session with Browndog we also offer our employees a number of other benefits. These include a pension scheme matched at 4%, £500 birthday bonus, assess to a health cash-back plan as well as a number of others. We also offer a wide variety of other benefits such as wellness days, an active training calendar, and enhanced holidays after 2 years service. If you would like to find out more about working at PHA or are interested in working with us, check out our careers page here.