AIBU to question conference/ business trips/ luxuries of business spending during a serious financial crisis?

[CoffeeMumForever]

I am confused how businesses and also areas of the public sector still spend so much money on conferences/ business trips with all the perks, staff privileges, parties. If this crisis is as bad as the powers make it out to be, how is this happening?

Our ‘away day’ was down the stairs in a conference room. We brought a packed lunch, and we all scuttled back to check our emails in the break. Totally living the high life on the taxpayer’s dime. Muahahahaha.

jealous? I can’t think of anything worse! I personally think that many people love business trips and get plenty of perks on them.

Business class travel has cut down a lot since covid.

Sending people out on business is expensive and also risky.

So a well run business is always going to limit the amount of travel its people do to the amount that is actually necessary.

Nowadays a lot of conferences are virtual.

Yes, if it's not your business, I think it is unreasonable to question how a private business manages their finances. That aside, there are tax benefits to certain activities, like spending £50 a head on a Christmas party or £150 per head on a conference, for example. Businesses don't spend money out of the goodness of their heart. It's because it's financially efficient for them to manage money in certain ways.

Recruitment and retention used to be a reason for a generous employee benefit package, but there are so many skilled people looking for work nowadays, companies don't actually have to compete to attract them.

Companies tend to have policies that protect the business, like key man protection, or PMI for senior staff, whose absence from the business would be far more costly than paying for them to have private tests/treatment and getting them back to work asap.

So really, they're not doing anything obscene in the current economic climate. They're managing their money efficiently.

well, you sound like a jealous moaning Minnie.

I’d be interested to hear of examples of private businesses which have said they’re threatened by rising costs and are also in your opinion wasting money.

public sector is interesting- while I’m sure that your average council employee is not enjoying travel or conference perks, I vaguely know an guy who was an MP and had some foreign office ministerial role in the last conservative government. I remember seeing his social media with him travelling S America for months on end with a few assistants and thinking “why is anyone funding this? If the UK was a business that budget would have been cut”.

if governments cut at all they seem to give every dept a small percentage cut rather than saying “right, x is a luxury and is being eliminated so we don’t have to cut y priority at all or in fact can give it more money”.

i find it totally bizarre.

Of the people I know in private sector, most of the expensive away trips seem to be for sales staff. Who are generating the money. Not to say that nobody ever goes anywhere but it's not often very flash for ordinary employees in my experience. Spending is cut back massively on occasions and travel bans for internal stuff are common in places I've worked. I do think other companies do bigger fancier parties and conferences but it's definitely not common across the board.

Currently public sector and we don't even get milk or teabags provided. Definitely no subsidised canteens or Christmas party, we sometimes do Christmas lunch but we self fund and a lot of people can't afford in December. I've not met the majority of people that do the same job as me in different locations.I've worked in the same role for well over 5 years and there are people I've spoken to individually on Teams many times. It isn't great for morale imo but it is what it is and you do what you can to make connections.

Like what?

It's nothing like what it was in the early-mid 00s. Not my expierence at all, I work for a national charity who does a lot of work alongside NHS, local and national government, everything has been stripped back to the bone. I work with fairly senior people and nobody is taking business trips.

We can't print anything, can't pay for meeting rooms, travel is pre-approved an public transport only and are on a pay freeze. But we'll still get a Xmas party, which will be drinks and nibbles in the office and meal out. Does that look bad, it probably does but when you can't pay people a cost of living increase the least you can do is take them out for lunch at Christmas time. Some would suggest we stop doing that too.

We hosted a conference as it was an outcome from our funders, but the venue was free, took the cheapest lunch option available and didn't do any extras. No printed programmes, no branded materials, no catered breaks (people could buy a coffee in the cafe on site). Please tell me where these lavish parties, conferences and business trips are happening in the public and charity sector.

Some will spend on fundraising gala dinners for donours, they're different as you usually earn much more from them than you spend. Likewise for conferences that charge a delegate fee these are often an income generator.

Business trips look like a big expense on the face of it but it’s nothing compared to cost saving that’s can be made from cutting staff. I’m off to the USA soon and we’ll have around 100 people travelling from around the world but mainly within the US to that same event. If it costs £200k that seems like a huge expense but it’s 2 people’s wages and employer contributions, maybe 3 people, maybe not even 2 depending on the role that’s going. The 2 activities can’t be compared, and that’s before you even get into what the business benefits of the event may be in terms of finding additional efficiencies or generating more revenue.

Conferences are valuable professional development and networking. I couldn’t do my job without keeping up with the wider profession and best practice. I also benefit us by sharing my work.

What are these perks for public sector employees that you speak of. Can you give some examples?

The public sector don’t get staff parties unless they pay for it. I had great parties at private companies and charities, but now I get nada even though these events are supposed to improve productivity, thus paying for themselves.

I’d like to know this too.
I travel for work and I have to travel economy ( even when I have to work the day I arrive - I’ve got changed at an airport more than once!), my hotel
budget is minimal and my meal allowance barely covers a main course and soft drink.
What perks have I missed?!

Until recently I went to a conference every year with a black tie dinner. It was in a Hilton in Birmingham by the side of a motorway and we had to get up at 6 and drive 2 hours to be back at the office for 9 the next day. I can't say it felt like a perk.

Well to be fair, they do book us into that crappy Travelodge just off the dual carriageway and buy us a burger from the Greene King pub next door when travelling on business, they don't make us sleep in the car. Perhaps that's what the OP means?

Public sector has cut back - first thing that happened when labour came into power. We have to get approval for travel over a certain amount from various different senior civil servants and same for any conferences / away days, so we haven’t had any.

Enjoying something and it serving a sensible business purpose are not mutually exclusive, OP.

A bloody massive pension for one!

I know someone only 8 years into their profession with £250k in their pot!!

I work for a large corporate and that kind of thing has been hugely slimmed down over the last few years. There are still conferences and so on but there are budget limits on how much can be spent on sending delegates, and a business justification has to be agreed at a senior level. Travel generally is also monitored.

No they don't 😂

😂😂😂😂😂

If you fly out on a business trip and secure a new sale worth £100k, then that 5k on flights and a hotel is well well worth it. Business trips are often essential, my dh has American clients, he needs to see them physically occasionally to keep the contract, it's built into how much they are charged by his business, and he'd rather not go, it isnt fun having jet lag and being away from home even if he does get a hotel and a few dinners. The clue is in the name really - business trip. No company is signing off jollies on the regular, of course conferences and meetings can include some socialising, drinks, dinners but they'll only be agreed if there is a clear business reason for them (new clients/business development, learning/professional development, expanding into a new market, smoozhing existing clients to keep a contract, ensuring face to face meetings happen etc). For parties, they'll be quite rare and will be based on morale and staff retention - capitalism only works if it keeps making money, businesses will all be keeping an eye on the pennies and doing a cost_benefit analysis of any spending at all. If there's not a good benefit, people won't be doing it. A lot of parties and socialising in the public sector is paid for by individuals, rather than cost/benefit, it tends to just be cost assessment in the public sector organisations I know (again, dh had a UK public sector client - not even free coffee or tea there and certainly no business class flights or jollies).

Considering public-sector pensions are defined-benefit schemes you don't build up a pot like that, that's not how it works, they don’t have a £250k pension pot sitting there. They may have a pension with a calculated value of £250k, but that’s very different from having £250k in an actual pot!
Someone's telling fibs or misunderstood how public sector pensions work.

If it’s actually a £250k pension pot, you’d be talking about putting roughly £2.5k a month into it for 8 years, depending growth. That’s not something you’d normally get from 8 years of a contributions to a Civil Service pension 😂.

Ps. I'm not denying public sector pensions are generous.

30% pension on a £90k salary.... Now on more than that so will only build