Following on from my post last week, I have been trying to establish what factors would drive employers to scrap their Childcare Voucher schemes before 2015. And it’s proving more difficult than I expected.

Firstly, the delegate voting at our events is anonymous (as it should be), so those that indicated that they are thinking about scrapping their voucher scheme early are unknown to me. So I have been forced to asking those employer’s I am encountering at various events if they are going to scrap their scheme (which most deny), and why they might consider such a course of action.

To be honest, this route has not taken me that far. But I have had the following reasons advanced as some of the perceived problems with the current voucher system:

1) The benefit is perceived as sexist, as it favours women over men

2) Hardly anyone uses it, so it’s a waste of time and money

3) It’s discriminatory, as only employees with children can utilise this benefit

4) It’s a benefit that has to be continued at employer cost throughout maternity leave

Now if these are the only drivers (and it’s difficult frankly to think of any others), I would counter the above four points (in order) as follows:

1) It’s not sexist. Either (or both) parents can claim Childcare Vouchers currently. For some reason there has always been the latent perception with some employers that it’s a benefit for mothers only. It’s not, and therefore (by definition) not sexist either.

2) It’s true that only a very small number of employees typically take advantage of Childcare Vouchers. Yet the benefit costs virtually nothing to provide (in fact the use of such vouchers creates a National Insurance saving for the employer). So where is the cost driver to remove this? Not only that, but for those few employees who do avail themselves of the vouchers, it’s often a really important benefit, and sometimes the difference between being able to work or not.

3) True, it is only of use for those employees with Children. But so what? Other employees are not losing out by this benefit being offered (as above, it costs hardly anything for the employer to provide Childcare Vouchers). It’s therefore not taking anything away from those without children (some of which may yet have need of Childcare support in the future).

4) This is the only argument that, to me, stands up. But the numbers of women approaching maternity leave who are already funding Childcare Vouchers is probably quite small, and the amounts involved capped by the usual Childcare Voucher limits as well, so for most employer’s I really can’t see this as a huge issue.

This is only my take on the situation, and I would really welcome alternative views from employers on this point. Should any new thoughts be forthcoming, I will of course share them on this blog.

Best regards

Steve