Bank recognised for generosity

Clydesdale and Yorkshire Banks won ‘Highly Commended’ in the Payroll Giving Award category at the Pay Awards this week and are on track for the Government accredited Gold Quality Mark award following the success of their Payroll Giving scheme. 

In relation to the size of their workforce, uptake among the bank’s staff to the Payroll Giving scheme is the highest of all high street banks with 12% of staff signed up raising nearly £150,000 a year for charity.  The success of Payroll Giving followed a re-launch of the scheme by professional fundraising organisation Workplace Giving UK and an extensive campaign to promote awareness and understanding among the organisation’s 10,000 UK based staff at branch, head office and business centres across the country.

Jacqui Atkinson, Clydesdale and Yorkshire Banks’ community affairs manager said: ‘We are delighted with the response from staff to the Payroll Giving initiative, particularly in such a short period of time. It’s something of which everyone should be rightly proud.’

Payroll Giving is a simple, tax efficient, scheme that allows employees to give to any charity they choose by having a deduction taken straight from their gross pay.  It is the only way for a higher rate tax payer to pass their 40% tax straight to their chosen cause as only 22% tax can be claimed back by charities under the Gift Aid scheme.

Workplace Giving UK works with organisations to promote the scheme to employees – this activity can typically increase employee participation in a scheme from around 2% to as much as 35%.  Recent research by Oxfam and YouGuv found that a third of British employees would give an average of £9.60 a month through their salary if they knew how to – this equates to a total of nearly £1bn annually.

For more information visit www.workplacegiving-uk.com