Financial stress doesn’t stay at home when employees start their shift. According to Zellis research, 92% of employees have experienced financial stress or worry in the past year, and 89% say it affects their working life. For employers, that translates into absenteeism, presenteeism, lower productivity and higher staff turnover.
To understand what actually helps, we partnered with the Centre for Personal Financial Wellbeing at Aston University on a new piece of research: Financial Wellbeing in the Workplace. We surveyed 1,242 employees using Hastee, which is owned by the Zellis group, to find out how tools like Earned Wage Access (EWA) and automated saving support people’s financial lives — and the results tell a compelling story about the journey from surviving to thriving.
Financial pressure is widespread, and resilience is hard to build
Over half of respondents (52%) said the cost of living is their biggest financial pressure, and 70% told us they’re struggling to keep up, or falling behind, with bills and commitments. Just 26% could cover an unexpected £300 bill, compared with 37% nationally (MoneyView 2025). Car repairs came up again and again as the unexpected expense that tips people over the edge — unsurprising, given RAC data shows 59% of drivers face unplanned repair bills averaging over £600 a year.
But there are clear signs that giving people more control over their pay improves how stable they feel:
- 67% feel more in control of their money
- 67% experience less stress between pay cycles
- 60% feel more confident managing money
- 60% feel better able to plan ahead
Pay timing unlocks capacity employers can’t see any other way
Nearly half of respondents (48%) said having access to flexible pay encouraged them to pick up extra shifts or overtime, and 64% said they’re more likely to stay with an employer that offers it. That’s a direct line between financial wellbeing benefits and two things every employer cares about: shift coverage and retention.
Flexible pay reduces reliance on informal borrowing
We also asked what people would do if they didn’t have flexible pay access when they needed it. The most common answer wasn’t a payday loan or BNPL — it was borrowing from friends and family (42%). That might sound harmless, but research shows informal borrowing often happens between people who are already financially stretched, and it can come with a real emotional cost: exposure, discomfort, and strain on relationships. As one respondent told us, earned wage access helped them keep their “dignity” and their “temporary money problem private.”
The unexpected finding: satisfaction is higher than the numbers suggest it should be
Perhaps the most striking result: 68% of respondents said they’re satisfied with their financial position, more than double the national average of 31% (MoneyView 2025) — despite lower savings rates and weaker financial resilience in our sample. We didn’t know exactly why this was. We thought it could be down to who we surveyed, who we serve, or the impact of the tools themselves — and we’ve since explored this further in our second research report, which is now also available (see below).
No single tool works in isolation
As Gethin Nadin, Chair of the Policy Liaison Group Workplace Wellbeing, puts it in the report: “no single tool changes financial wellbeing in isolation.” One in two employees using Earned Wage Access are also engaging with financial education, AI-driven guidance, health checkups, or automated saving — reinforcing that real progress comes from a full financial wellbeing ecosystem, not a single feature.
Read the full report
This blog only scratches the surface. The full report, produced with the Centre for Personal Financial Wellbeing at Aston University, includes the complete survey methodology, data breakdowns and further analysis on financial exclusion.
Download the full Financial Wellbeing in the Workplace research report:
https://www.zellis.com/focus/financial-wellbeing-in-the-workplace-research-report/
We’ve since followed up this research with a second report, Lived Experiences with Financial Wellbeing Tools, which explores the ‘why’ behind these findings through in-depth panels with employees. Download it here:
https://www.zellis.com/focus/lived-experiences-with-financial-wellbeing-tools/
