L’Oreal used auto-enrolment to re-evaluate reward

For international beauty products firm L’Oréal, auto-enrolment has been an opportunity to re-evaluate its wider reward and benefits proposition.

Working with Buck Consultants, it identified four areas of reward: pay and bonus, savings and investment, more generic benefits such as private medical insurance or life assurance, and healthy living, says Ben Marks, HR compensation and benefits director.

These will be tied together in a flexible benefits platform it will launch shortly after its auto-enrolment staging date on 1 August.

“We believe it’s a good thing people save for their pension, but part of our reward strategy is to attract, retain and motivate, so our benefits have to be appealing and relevant,” says Marks.

On the savings side, L’Oréal is looking to complement its pensions offerings with other products, including a corporate individual savings account (Isa) and an employee share scheme.

Marks admits that looking at the wider reward picture while trying to roll out auto-enrolment is ambitious, but one advantage is to ensure that those who are already in an existing scheme remain engaged, even while the main focus is on auto-enrolment.

“The key is to segment our staff so we can say ‘autoenrolment doesn’t affect you, but engage with us on flex’,” he says.