Employee Welfare

Definition: Employees Welfare is a term which includes the perks and benefits provided to the employees of the organization apart from their regular salary or remuneration, the main motive of serving employee benefits services is to improve or enhance the employee’s well-being.

Employee welfare measures are the efforts made by the employer to bring the desired results by motivating and satisfying their employees.

An organization should always treat employee welfare measures as their investment rather than an expense as satisfied personnel will always provide a satisfying result in return.

Content: Employee Welfare

1. Measures/ Benefits of Employee Welfare
   • Statutory Measures
   • Voluntary Measures
2. Objectives of Employee Welfare
3. Conclusion

Measures/ Benefits of Employee Welfare

Activities carried by the employer for the employee’s benefit are known as the measures of employee welfare.

Providing such measures is a continuous process of the organization broadly divided into two categories:

Statutory Measures

Measures or benefits decided or set up by the government as a legal obligation for an employer for safeguarding the employee’s interest at their workplace are the statutory measures which include:

• Working Hours Limit: As per labour act time for which the employee will work is defined as maximum 9 hours per day, if any over-time work is taken above 9 hours it will be remunerated twice the regular salary for an hour.
• Providing First Aid Facility: Providing adequate first aid facilities to the employees is morale as well as statutory responsibility of the employer against his/her employees.

So that in case of any medical emergency or mishappening timely and appropriate treatment can be provided.

• Canteen Facility: Every organization should have a facility of a canteen for the employees within an organization so that they need not rush outside for lunch.

However free meals services are apart from this service as they are voluntary services provided by the organization to their employees, but canteen facility is a paid service by an organization, and therefore the employee needs to pay from his pocket for the food or beverage he/she consumes.

• Drinking-Water Facility: An organization must fulfill the general necessities of an employee within an organization, and the drinking water is one of the essential need of any human; thus it’s the responsibility of the employer to look after this service necessarily.
• Sanitation Facility: Providing proper sanitation facilities to the employees working in the organization is legal as well as the moral duty of the employer.

Separate toilets should be provided for male and female employees.

• Washing Facility: Segregate washing space should be provided to the employees of the organization.
• Maternity Benefits: This facility is provided to the female employees of the company while they conceive or give birth to a child, the employee gets a pay without work as an employee benefit and a leave of 6 months for taking care of her child.

Voluntary Measures

These are the measures which are voluntarily provided by the employer to the employees without and legal obligation just to facilitate them as much as the employer can.

Some of the voluntary measures are as follows:

• Recreation Facility: Recreation facilities are the facilities provided to the employees to refresh them from the stress and burden of continuous work; the facilities involve gaming, spa and organizing small get to-gathers.

However, the employer is not legally bound to provide such facilities, but with an increasing stress level now-a-days the big multinational companies provide such facilities to their employees on their cost, to improve the efficiency of the employees.

• Education Facility: Some organization facilitates the schooling facilities for the children of the employees working in their organization; however, it is not a statutory obligation for an employer it totally depends upon the employer’s ability and wishes to provide such facility or not.
• Transport Facility: Organizations which emphasis concern towards their employees and take care about their safety facilitates the cab facility, especially considering their female employee’s safety, as working hours may differ and shifts may vary from day to night.
• Free Meal Facility: Beverages and snacks provided to the employees during the working hours are known as a free meal facility provided to the employees.

However, an employee cannot claim an exemption for the free meals coupons received from the employer as per new income tax rule with effect from FY 20-21 (previously it was exempted up to 50/- per meal twice a day), although can still avail the exemption for free food and non-alcoholic beverages cost provided in working hours in premises.

 

Objectives of Employee Welfare

Employees welfare serves the primary objective of the organization, i.e., it enhances the relationship of the employer and the employees.

Some of the other major objectives of it are as follows:

• Providing Motivation: Employees working in the organization are precious assets, who need to be motivated from time to time.

The company can adopt various measures to motivate them; one of the measure amongst them is providing welfare facilities as described above, i.e., Statutory and voluntary services or facilities.

• Retaining Employees: Companies which knows the value of the talented and experienced employees provides various facilities to their employees.

So that the employee will remain in the company for a longer period of time as if an employee will not be satisfied with the organization he/she may switch the organization.

• Increases Productivity: Motivated employees always serves better productivity to the organization, which enhances the companies as well his personal career growth day by day.

It is one of the long-term objectives of providing welfare measures to the employees.

• Creating Goodwill: Companies tries to create and maintain their goodwill in the market full of completion by providing relevant employee benefits to their employees.

It also helps them to attract talented employees to join their company.

• Creates Strong employer-employee bond: Providing employee welfare benefits acts as a give and take relationship amongst the employer and the employees.

If employees need is taken into consideration by the employer, it builds a strong bond amongst them and employee also tries to give his/her best for the development of the organization by showing their involvement in their work and providing relevant results as achievements.

Conclusion

Employee Welfare is nothing but an effort made by the employer to enhance the lifestyle of the employees working for their organization.

It has become an essential factor for every organization who wants growth in the future; therefore, companies adopt various measures for providing the employee welfare benefits to their employees for providing them comfort.