Direct Line Sets Minimum Wage at 18K a Year – Will Other Insurers Follow?

The minimum wage in the UK is set to rise to £7.83 per hour for employees aged 25 and over, with 21-24 year olds receiving £7.38 per hour. But some companies are going beyond the legal requirement and one of them is Direct Line – a big name in the UK insurance market. Will other companies follow suit? Many brokerages and insurers currently offer a starting salary in call centres of between £16K-17K outside of London/SE, but this may well rise to 18K later this year.

From the 1 April, 2018, 1,000 employees at Direct Line Group will benefit from a new minimum salary of either £18,000 for a 37.5 hour a week contract or £17,000 for a 35 hour a week contract.  The new minimum salary is six per cent higher than the Living Wage Foundation and 18 per cent higher than the Government’s National Minimum Wage.  Going forward all new joiners (with the exception of apprentices) will be paid at least the new minimum salary.

Anyone keen on applying for a role at Direct Line Group, can do so at; www.directlinegroupcareers.com

In addition to the new minimum salary, to enable everyone to share in the Group’s success and celebrate the company’s fifth birthday, Direct Line Group has awarded a £500 free share award to all employees hired before 27 February and still employed on the day they are granted (29 March). Following this award, an employee who has been with the company since IPO and received, and retained, the three previous free share awards (£250, £400, £250), will now have a total holding of 446 shares (potential total worth of £2018.10 based on the closing share price yesterday and including dividends paid to date).

Simon Linares, HR director, Direct Line Group, commented:

“2017 was the fifth successive year we have delivered growth in the businesses. We could not do this without the hard work and dedication of our talented people. My objective this year was to ensure that as many colleagues as possible receive a meaningful pay increase, specifically targeted at those in lower paid roles. This is why we are introducing a new company wide minimum salary of either £17,000 or £18,000 (depending on contracted hours) which delivers an average pay increase of around five per cent to those people in our lowest paid front line roles and a minimum pay increase of £650 for everyone across the organisation.

“We are an organisation with a clear mission, to make insurance easier and better value for our customers. It is our people that make this happen and we want to continue to boost the rewards both to retain our brilliant people and attract the best talent to the business.”