How Derwent London is catering to the needs of employees with long-term health conditions
At Derwent, our culture of respect and care manifests in tangible ways. We have a ‘smart working’ policy and provide a range of health and dental benefits, an employee assistance programme and access to occupational health support. In return, our employees are encouraged to take personal responsibility to proactively maintain and improve their own health and wellbeing to the best of their ability.
We have a health cash plan in place, which is really popular and offers an affordable way to help with everyday healthcare costs, including optical, specialist consultations, dental and health screening. Any joiners to the scheme with pre-existing conditions can still claim within the limits.
Our private medical insurance scheme does have an excess – however, that can be claimed back via the cash plan. It also has medical-history disregarded underwriting, which is particularly attractive for anyone who may have a long-term health condition. The organisation covers the cost of the employee’s cover, and if someone wishes to add their partner or children to a scheme, they can pay an additional cost, which is then deducted from their monthly salary via payroll.
Many of us spend far too much time in front of a screen, which can cause neck and back pain and headaches, among other things. We have display screen equipment assessments set up for all new joiners, while longer standing employees are regularly required to submit any changes to their health and can request for equipment or adjustments to be put in place, which we will always support where possible.
We achieved the National Equality Standard in 2021, and we signed up to become a member of the Business Disability Forum in 2023. This helped us to understand more about disabilities, accessibility and long-term conditions, as we are conscious that many people feel uncomfortable disclosing this information. This may be because they don’t see themselves as someone with a disability, or they may worry about the consequences of sharing.
We supplement our core benefits through ‘lunch and learns’, free annual flu jabs onsite, line manager training and being part of the #10,000 Able Interns Programme, and we work with guest speakers to discuss specific conditions like neurodiversity and invisible conditions. We also have a diversity and inclusion newsletter, which, more recently, highlighted three case studies of employees who have a disability or long-term condition. Employees now offer their stories to be used in future editions of the newsletter, which is a great culture shift.
Absence levels are very low, our employee satisfaction levels are high year on year, and our referrals to occupational health are minimal.
The current climate brings financial pressure and a multi-generational workforce with different needs and expectations, but, if you want to attract top talent and keep them, you’re going to have to look after them.
