px limited

O&M Let us take the strain

px Win An Award

The generosity of power generating staff at the px Group has been marked with a special award.

Judges at the Employee Benefits Awards 2007 event, at London’s Park Lane Hilton Hotel, were so impressed by the company's commitment to charitable giving that they selected it for the ‘Most effective use of a payroll giving strategy’ honour.

px launched a payroll giving scheme in 2002 in conjunction with the Charitable Aid Foundation (CAF). To enhance the scheme and maximise employee contributions, the company matches all gifts up to a maximum of £2,500 a year per employee. It also covers the costs of administering the scheme.

Over the past four years the scheme has grown steadily and now has 57 staff contributing a total of £18,289 in 2006/7. The initiative is promoted via emails on National Giving Week, to all new staff, at all annual benefits renewal meetings for staff, on the HR intranet, and on an ad-hoc basis.

The citation read: "The element that marked this entry out as a winner was px's broader strategy of charitable giving. Staff who are undertaking sponsorship for an event are encouraged to promote it through the company, usually via email. All monies raised are then put through payroll and again the amount is matched corporately.

px also holds charity raffles on an ad-hoc basis and has supported the 'Wear it pink' campaign for breast cancer, an annual asthma campaign and the WWF Extinct campaign, as well as running a charitable fund for local causes.

This was the first time px had entered the awards and Chief Executive Officer, Tim Underdown, said: "As a company, we strive to be corporately responsible in everything we do so encouraging our staff to do their bit for worthy causes is a natural extension of this philosophy. They don’t do it for the recognition – but it’s nice to get it all the same."