Corporate Fitness

Healthy employees are worth their weight in gold. Many employers try to promote a healthy lifestyle at work with standing desks and healthy lunches. Or a leased bicycle for the commute.

As an entrepreneur, you can take it a step further and let your employees exercise with tax advantages. An interesting choice, as a corporate fitness plan offers several benefits. You can differentiate yourself by offering an attractive benefit. You show that you care about the health of your employees, which is greatly appreciated. You can create a moment where you, as a company, do something during working hours that is not work-related. Many advantages, indeed. And this advantage has another advantage. Tax benefits.

What is a Corporate Fitness Plan

With a corporate fitness plan, you ensure that your employees can exercise affordably. There are several ways you can achieve this. You can provide your employees with corporate fitness through the work cost scheme (WKR), allowing them to exercise at company expenses. Another way is to let your employees pay the amount with tax benefits through a cafeteria scheme. In this second option, they pay the costs for the gym from their gross salary, which net provides a nice advantage. The tax benefit is equal to the percentage of wage tax. That’s a nice bonus.

A corporate fitness plan through a cafeteria model is thus ultimately a way for employees to pay less for their sports subscriptions. But employers also benefit tax-wise, as the social charges for the employer are lower.

Why Exercise via Employer

“Why should an organization arrange a corporate fitness subscription?” you might wonder. Is exercising not a personal choice? Something done on weekends? Not necessarily.

There are several reasons why it is interesting for an employee to encourage exercising. One of the main reasons is the health benefits of exercising itself. Although this seems primarily an advantage for the employee, the entrepreneur also benefits from it.

These health benefits of exercising ensure that employees perform better and are more productive. Because it provides energy, allowing people to focus better. It can also reduce health problems and lead to less sick leave. A great benefit for you as an employer. Physical and mental health go hand in hand. Exercising is good for mental health as it reduces stress. Stress (and especially its consequences) is what leads to employee absenteeism and reduces productivity.

Benefits of Corporate Fitness

• If you, as an entrepreneur, offer corporate fitness through the WKR, you show that you value their health and prioritize it.

• With a flexible fitness scheme, you offer an attractive secondary employment condition that distinguishes you in the labor market.

• Employees who use the sports subscription are physically healthier, and it also has benefits for mental health. Exercising reduces stress.

• When you let employees finance their fitness subscription through a cafeteria model, you as an employer save on the social charges that you normally pay on wages.

• Corporate fitness also provides tax benefits for employees. Through a cafeteria model, they pay significantly less than if they were to purchase a subscription through their net salary.

Work Cost Scheme Corporate Fitness

As an entrepreneur, you can use the free space of the WKR to pay various reimbursements for your employees tax-free. This means you can give certain gifts on top of the salary - lunches, outings, and also a sports subscription through the employer. This could mean that you arrange a boot camp for your team, or offer a fitness subscription of their choice.

Providing corporate fitness through the WKR allows you to bear the costs yourself. Your employees do not contribute to this.

The advantage of corporate fitness through the work cost scheme is that you can report the costs tax-free. When you offer a corporate fitness subscription through the work cost scheme, you do not have to keep track of the costs per employee.

Alleo makes exercising through your employer easier with a wide range of 10,000+ fitness and gym subscriptions.

Conditions for Corporate Fitness

When you want to offer corporate fitness through the WKR, you need to pay close attention to a number of conditions.

• Pay attention to the free space of the WKR.

• Participation in fitness at the employer's expense must be available to 90% or more of the employees working at the same location.

• The corporate fitness must take place at the company's own location, a chosen fitness center (one for all employees), or branches of one fitness company with which an agreement has been made.

• When you offer your employees a fitness subscription through the cafeteria scheme, it is important that it is approved by the tax authorities.

Arrange a Corporate Fitness Subscription for Your Employees? Get in Touch!

As we mentioned earlier, healthy athletes are worth their weight in gold. They perform better, feel better, and are less often sick. That is great for employers. Employees appreciate the fact that their employer allows them to exercise for less – or at the employer's expense. Since there are many different options for corporate fitness subscriptions and many people have personal preferences for which sport they engage in, it is interesting to let employees choose where they exercise themselves. Corporate fitness or exercising through your employer is easier to arrange with Alleo.