Gender Pay Gap Report 2019
www.animalfriends.co.uk
About Animal Friends Insurance
Westley Pearson Managing Director
Tanya Johnson Director of People
We are incredibly invested in equality and diversity at Animal Friends Insurance. Our Senior Leadership Team has an almost 50/50 gender split and women out-number men at all other levels of our company, which is unique in an industry that is traditionally very male-dominated. This is an excellent reflection of our culture and values, and although there is always morework to do, I amproud that we are breaking that tradition and are on par or above other companies in our sector in almost all areas. We continue to strive to be a truly diverse and inclusive company where everyone knows they are valued for their individual contribution.
We are absolutely committed to providing a welcoming and diverse working environment here at Animal Friends, and that also includes reducing our gender pay gap and bonus gap. Companies of over 250 employees are required by the government to produce an annual report, and although we have calculated this before, we are pleased to publish our first Gender Pay Gap Report as taken from a snapshot of our company at April 2019.
Male
Female
Our Staff…
36.34 % †
63.66 % †
Amesbury Total Staff: 286
Swindon Total Staff: 84
Other * Total Staff: 3
* Other locations (homebased)
† Gender split of Animal Friends Insurance employees at April 2019
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Gender Pay Gap Report 2019 – Animal Friends Insurance
Our Gender Pay & Bonus Gap
What is the Gender Pay Gap?
Median Pay Gap Our MEDIAN pay gap is lower than the UK average (11.9 %), however it is significantly lower than generally found in Financial Services (22.3%).
Simply put, it’s the difference in average earnings between males and females, given as a percentage. However, it means that even if all employees are paid fairly for their roles, should a business have more men in senior positions, and more women in junior positions, a larger gender pay gap will be reported.
4.9 %
Our mean pay gap is roughly in line with other companies across the UK, although it is lower than generally found in Financial Services and Insurance. Our median pay gap is lower than the UK average, and lower than most companies in all of the relevant comparators. It is especially marked when compared to the Financial Services and Insurance industries. Mean vs. Median – What’s the difference? The mean is calculated by adding up all the salaries of the male employees and dividing this by the number of men we employ. Then the same is done for female employees. The mean pay gap is the difference between these two numbers, given as a percentage. The median is simpler – calculated by ordering every male’s salary from the lowest to the highest, and picking the number directly in themiddle. This is also done for the females. Themedian pay gap is the difference between these two numbers, given as a percentage.
Pay Gap Mean Pay Gap
15.9 %
Our MEAN pay gap is slightly higher than the UK average (14.2%), however it is significantly lower than generally found in Financial Services (26.7%).
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Gender Pay Gap Report 2019 – Animal Friends Insurance
Pay Quartiles
Lower
Upper Middle
Mean Gap: 0.2% Median Gap: 0.0%
Mean Gap: 2.0% Median Gap: 1.8%
30 % 70 %
38 % 62 %
Lower Middle
Upper
Mean Gap: 1.0% Median Gap: 1.4%
Mean Gap: 16.0% MedianGap: 21.2%
40 % 60 %
44 % 56 %
The percentage of men and women employed by Animal Friends within four equally sized quartiles based on their hourly pay rate as at April 2019.
Our pay gap is smallest in the lower quartile, which typically have structured salary levels for roles which are not negotiated on joining the company. The pay gap is largest in the Upper quartilewhich is not uncommon – however, it must be noted that we employmorewomen than men in every quartile. This in turn impacts our pay gap by bringing both themean andmedian female salary down. Although the pay gap is skewed due to employing more women than men, the opposite is true of males. More men are employed in senior positions than in lower positions, which brings both the mean and median male salary up.
It must be noted that we employ more women than men in every quartile
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Gender Pay Gap Report 2019 – Animal Friends Insurance
Bonus Gap Mean Bonus Gap
Median Bonus Gap
67.2 %
11.5 %
8.4 % more women received a bonus than men
Bonuses are paid at Animal Friends as a percentage of salary, therefore higher salaried employees receive higher bonuses. The median gap – which accounts for extremes at either end – shows a much smaller gap, which is significantly lower than the average gap in Financial Services (31.2%). Additionally, the bonus pay gaps are not adjusted for the number of hours worked. Therefore, a larger number of women working part-time will lead to a larger bonus gap, as bonuses were paid as a percentage of salary.
A slightly higher proportion ofwomen thanmen received bonus pay in the 12months prior to April 2019 at Animal Friends, with 72%ofwomen and 66% of men receiving bonuses. At the time of this report, there were more men than women in the Senior Leadership Team, which resulted in a larger amount of bonus paid at the top level, which explains the much larger bonus gap.
24 women and 3 Men were part time workers at the time of this report
2018 Median Pay Gap
Year on Year Comparison
9.9 %
Both our mean and median pay gaps have improved year on year – with the mean pay gap reduced by 6.7% and the median gap reduced by 5%. It is encouraging to see that we have improved significantly in one year, and hope to continue this. Overall, our median gap is lower than the UK average and again much lower than generally found in Financial Services. Despite reporting smaller gaps than other financial services, there is room for improvement, and we are committed to continuing in this direction.
Although we are not required to publish our 2018 gender pay gap or bonus gap, we have calculated it in order to view our progress over the course of the year, and identify ways to further improve it.
2018 Mean Pay Gap
22.5 %
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Gender Pay Gap Report 2019 – Animal Friends Insurance
What We’re Doing to Close the Pay Gap
of initiatives to aid this reduction, chief among which is benchmarking for all existing roles. Any employee who fell under 80% of the market median was brought up to this level, and all new roles are now benchmarked going forward, so we are confident men and women are being paid within the correct range for their role. Additionally, bonuses are now equally awarded to the majority of the company on a percentage basis. Applying the same rules where possible has led to a reduced median bonus gap, although the mean gap still remains large.
We are incredibly passionate about providing a culture of fairness, consistency, and transparency at Animal Friends in order to ensure we are welcoming and diverse. Working to improve our gender pay gap and bonus gap is a long-term goal, and we must ensure our initiatives are sustainable. Any initiatives put in place are selected because they are best practices that are fully embedded in the culture of our company. We can already see an improvement between 2018 and 2019, particularly with our bonus gap. Between the two reporting periods, we’ve introduced a number
Working to improve our gender pay gap and bonus gap is a long-term goal, and we must ensure our initiatives are sustainable
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Gender Pay Gap Report 2019 – Animal Friends Insurance
Shaping Our Future
Vision: To create a better life for every animal. Mission: By collaborating with a community of animal lovers, we will: Better understand our customers’ needs and strive to exceed them. Provide industry-leading insurance and first-class pet care. Contribute our time, expertise and financial support to help charities make a positive impact in animal welfare. Our Values: We are courageous. We do something that challenges us and takes us out of our comfort zone. We are passionate. We embrace adventure
Some actions have alreadybeenput inplace, such as introducing benchmarking forall roles, paying everyone within a set range for their role, implementing a robust recruitment policywith structured, competency-based questioning, and applying company-wide consistent bonus criterion. However, one of the most important initiatives is the recent launch of our new values:
These core values are part of everything we do, and help define the evolution of our culture into one where everyone feels they have a truly equal opportunity to progress their career with Animal Friends. As part of redefining our future, we will shortly be rolling out two programmes: leadership and performance management, with a view to analyse gender pay gaps that may arise. With monitoring and analysis, we can feed this into our efforts and ensure we treat everyone fairly and consistently. Additionally, all managers will undergo unconscious bias training. We are also reviewing our flexible working policies with a view to open roles within Animal Friends to new groups of people whommay otherwise not have the opportunity. Overall, we remain committed to improving our culture to one of inclusivity and fairness, and are confident that these measures will continue to reduce our gender pay gap, bonus gap, and make Animal Friends an attractive employer to a diverse group of talented men and women.
in the pursuit of excellence in all we do. We are kind-hearted. We hope to inspire others by doing the right thing and treating others with respect.
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Gender Pay Gap Report 2019 – Animal Friends Insurance
Animal Friends’ approach to workplace culture and diversity
At Animal Friends, we promote a culture of fairness and transparency, and coupled with our people’s passion for animal welfare and charitable giving, we are able to provide a diverse and welcoming place to work that focusses on our peoples’ wellbeing. Here’s what some of the female Senior Leadership Team have to say about Animal Friends, and the work we need to do to continue improving our gender pay gap and bonus gap. What working at Animal Friends means for us “It’s the perfect mix of helping charity partners make an impact on animal welfare, and working on fantastic campaigns within a commercial environment.” Patricia Gardiner Director of Marketing Animal Friends is here to provide leading online veterinary care, and preventative care for healthy animals. As such, having a passion for animals and animal welfare is an essential part of the working ethos, and we attract candidates with these interests. Employees at all levels are able to enjoy a range of company benefits, from a HIVE portal where they can access important information, tools, and life hacks. Specialist Mental Health First Aiders are on hand to ensure individual’s needs and preferences are respected and catered for, in any eventuality. Our robust benefits package offers discounts at over 800 retailers, plus flexible working is available and encouraged where possible. People are even able to bring their dog to work with them! Essentially, we have something to offer everyone, no matter their age, gender, race, sexual orientation, or stage in life.
We are proud to open our doors to a diverse pool of talent and provide themwith a fantastic working culture. “I’ve enjoyed a 50% discount on my pet insurance (2 dogs, 1 cat), plus a 5% discount on my supermarket shop and across other retailers. The overall benefits package has enabled me to take my birthday off, contributed to my pension, allowed me to bring dog into work, and have a free JOII vet telephone consultation for my poorly pooch!” Vicky Manning-Boyett People Development and Talent Manager Evolution, not revolution – our Core Values The world is changing, and we must change with it. While our gender pay gap and bonus gap have improved year on year, we still have much work to do to stay on the correct path and continue to reduce the gap. As part of this commitment, we have evolved our company vision, mission, and core values, to better reflect who we are and where we want to be. By having all employees on the same page, they can represent our values in their day-to-day work. The process of evolving our core ethos involved more than the Leadership Team debating – we also engaged with all colleagues, and challenged them to come up with an animal that they felt best represented each value. This was a conscious decision to ensure our evolution was a truly company-wide decision, and everyone felt able to contribute meaningfully. Fairness and transparency are at the heart of what we do, and evolving these elements of our culture will improve our pay gap – it also shows we are a company with values and good practice at our core.
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Gender Pay Gap Report 2019 – Animal Friends Insurance
Key Initiatives Implemented “We implemented the benchmarking of our roles at the beginning of 2019 – which is particularly exciting to me. It is comforting to know that all my colleagues are being rewarded correctly and fairly for their roles.” Tanya Johnson Director of People There have been a number of key initiatives rolled out through the company, and part of their purpose is to ensure our culture is one of fairness by also opening the hiring doors to groups of people whom otherwise not have been able to join – ensuring we are as accommodating as we can be to a diverse group of potential candidates. Some of these key initiatives include; 1 Evaluated all company roles and benchmarked salaries. We conducted this analysis using external data to ensure AFI remained impartial and accurate, and can make informed remuneration decisions. 2 Reinforced benchmarking standards in regards to recruitment. Additionally, we evolved our recruitment process to a standardised one, and followed up with recruitment training and best practice, including unconscious bias. 3 Relaunched our company values. One of the most influential changes, we wanted to showcase that values are a company cornerstone by integrating performance management structures, bonus structures, and reward/recognition policies.
We’re also excited to be introducing a new Leadership Development Framework in the near future, and take steps to always have a pipeline of diverse talent coming through the business! Findings from employee feedback survey Fantastic survey results with an employee approval rating of over… 90 % Note: this was conducted prior to current world events (pre-lockdown), however we still have some things to learn and are working hard to improve in all areas of employee satisfaction. We strive to offer all our people a values-driven environment, where everyone can make a difference both in their role and for the charities they support. This feeds into creating a diverse workforce, although we still have work to do to improve this. Sharing a common ethos, cemented by our evolved mission, vision, and core values, helps Animal Friends continue to improve, and offer a diverse workplace where our people are able to make a difference to animals and animal welfare.
Our senior female leadership team
Patricia Gardiner Director of Marketing
Wendy Jiang Director of Finance
Tanya Johnson Director of People
Vicky Manning-Boyett People Development and Talent Manager
Margaret Traynor Chief Risk and Compliance Officer
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Gender Pay Gap Report 2019 – Animal Friends Insurance
THE ANIMAL FRIENDS WAY
Sharing a common ethos, cemented by our evolved mission, vision, and core values, helps Animal Friends continue to improve, and offer a diverse workplace where our people are able to make a difference to animals and animal welfare.
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