How can companies set up a cycle to work scheme?

There are lots of benefits to employers of joining a cycle to work scheme, like improved workforce health, morale and productivity, savings on Secondary Class 1 National Insurance contributions and reduced need for car-parking infrastructure. For many companies, though, it may not be clear how to set up a cycle to work scheme.

Although setting up a scheme is actually quite straightforward, there are a few factors that can confuse matters if you’re not familiar with the process. Firstly, the cycle to work scheme itself is set out in UK legislation, but is delivered by a number of commercial partners, like Bike2Work Scheme. One of the first hurdles for any company is choosing which providers to go with.

We believe there are a number of reasons why Bike2Work Scheme is the best scheme provider, but there are other good providers out there too. That’s why we’ve put together a free, impartial guide to choosing a provider, which covers things like bike shop networks and support that providers may offer.

Once you’ve chosen a provider, signing up is straightforward. To our knowledge, you can sign up for any provider online (our employer sign-up form is here for example) and for free. The only cost to a company comes when – or if – it agrees to buy a bike for an employee.

Having set up a scheme, all that’s left for companies to do is let their employees know about it and administer any purchases made. Communicating a scheme to employees can be as simple as adding it to employee benefits lists, publishing articles on an intranet and putting up posters.

Administering a scheme, meanwhile, just needs a company to draw up into an agreement the terms under which it wants to buy bikes and equipment for employees to use and to ensure that separate hire agreements for bikes or equipment are set up and followed. There’s flexibility for companies in choosing the terms of employer-employee agreements and in the length of hire periods they are willing to offer.

And that’s all there is to it. If you want more information, you can download our guide, or get in touch – we’ll be happy to answer any questions you have!

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