Employees want employers to help with expense of returning to office: survey

'Inflation has made coming to the office more expensive than ever,' says expert citing need to address 'cost-of-work crisis'

BY Dexter Tilo 01 May 2024

Employers should be shouldering office return-related expenses if they want employees to come back on-site, according to respondents in a new survey.

More than half of employees want their employers to cover their expenses related to parking (72%), uniform (67%), and toll roads (51%), found Capterra.

Others said employers should at least help them share these costs, according to the report, which polled 2,716 employees globally.

The findings come as 60% said inflation has made the cost to work go up in the last 12 months.

Hybrid employees, who are working both remotely and on-site on specific days, have been hit the hardest (64%), compared with those fully on-site (60%) or fully remote (45%), found Capterra.

Six in 10 respondents said they would ask for a raise if their employers would make them spend their own income to come to work, while 59% said they would look for a new job.

"Employees used to commute to work without questioning the cost to do so. That's no longer the reality in 2024," said Brian Westfall, principal HR analyst at Capterra, in a statement.

"Inflation has made coming to the office more expensive than ever, and if companies don’t address this cost-of-work crisis, they will have a hard time getting employees to RTO happily."

Mitigating office return expenses

Capterra offered four potential solutions to help employers implement office return amid surging costs. They include:

Cover costs through employee stipends. Companies can take on the cost-of-work burden carried by employees when coming to the office.
Reduce costs through flexible policies and onsite events. Implement a more casual dress code and flexible hours, allowing employees to avoid peak traffic hours and reduce transportation-related costs.
Help employees budget through financial wellness programmes. Offer financial wellness benefits to help employees better manage the costs.
Offset costs to be at the office by reducing hybrid and remote worker compensation. It comes as 36% of respondents said they would take a pay cut to keep working remotely.

"Stipends are the most direct way to mitigate these costs for employees, but this isn’t the only solution. Financial wellness benefits can help employees better budget their pay; flexible schedules can reduce the time employees spend in costly traffic. HR leaders need to be proactive and creative to reduce this financial burden on their workers," Westfall said.