Mills and Reeve to launch new benefits portal

EXCLUSIVE: Law firm Mills and Reeve is to build a dedicated employee benefits portal through which staff can access all of the organisation’s benefits in one place. 

Mills & Reeve

The organisation, which currently has benefits information spread across its intranet, voluntary benefits and flexible benefits sites, will use new HR technology provided by its voluntary benefits provider, Reward Gateway.

Samantha Neaves, reward and HR information systems manager at Mills and Reeve, said: “We have a lot of HR information on the staff intranet and on our flexible benefits platform, but it is difficult for employees to find the relevant information. [Staff] get lost and lose engagement.

“It is not very exciting to access, but building an interactive, all encompassing HR portal will change that.

“What captured my imagination was that we can build this ourselves. We wanted to have more control.”

Phase one of Mills and Reeve’s project will include the redesign of its voluntary benefits scheme to make the website more responsive on smartphones, tablets and computers. This will be rolled out to staff by April.

Phase two of the project involves moving its entire employee benefits information, including all core and flexible benefits, onto its new portal. This will be completed in the summer of 2015.

The organisation also plans to increase its benefits communication, which will involve uploading its MyReward benefits guide online, giving employees the opportunity to have both hard and digital copies of the information. 

Neaves said: “It will be a huge project this year and we are already communicating to employees what we are doing.

“It will not only boost engagement but also communication. It will help target groups of employees, especially new starters, to highlight and nudge them to the portal so that they get the right information a couple of months before they can start choosing their options.

“For example, we could push them in the direction of the top 10 things they need to know about their benefits, and help them understand what flex means.

“It is building something from the ground up, and [allowing] us to be more in charge and go at our own pace. It will help make our benefits offering more transparent.”

The employer, which was ranked in The Sunday Times Best 100 Companies to Work For 2015 for the 12th year running, also plans to focus on offering more financial education to employees.