How to Reward Remote & Hybrid Employees in Ireland

How much of the Irish workforce is working from home

Working from home settled into a steady pattern rather than disappearing. In the first quarter of 2026 the CSO recorded 990,070 people in employment who work from home at least some of the time, out of 2,794,500 people in work. Of those, 525,200 usually work from home, meaning more than half their hours, and 464,900 do so occasionally. Just over 64% never work at home at all.

So roughly one worker in three is out of the building at least part of the week, and about half a million people are out of it more often than they are in it. That is not a fringe group you can handle with an exception.

The legal backdrop is stable too. The Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment published its first statutory review of the right to request remote working in March 2026. It found 94% of requests approved in full or in part, little administrative burden reported by employers, and no case for amending the legislation. Plan on the basis that hybrid is permanent.

Why an office-shaped reward budget quietly fails

Most reward spending is anchored to a building. The coffee, the Friday lunch, the summer barbecue, the Christmas do in Dublin. Every one of those is worth something to the people who show up and nothing to the person taking the call from a spare room in Ennis. Over a year the gap compounds, and it compounds in favour of whoever lives nearest the office.

The second problem is money that never arrives. If a reward goes through payroll as a bonus it is taxed as pay, and employer PRSI is due on top. Class A employer PRSI is 11.25% on weekly earnings above €552, unchanged in Budget 2026, and it rises to 11.4% from 1 October 2026. Put €500 through payroll for someone on the top marginal rate of 52.2% and it costs you around €556 and leaves them with about €239. Run the same €500 as a qualifying benefit under the Small Benefit Exemption and it costs €500 and delivers €500. Rates and thresholds move with each Budget, so confirm the current position with your accountant before a large rollout.

Building a reward approach that works at a distance

Pick rewards that do not depend on a postcode

Anything posted brings address data you have probably not kept current and a delivery you cannot control. Anything tied to a venue rewards proximity. A digital reward the recipient chooses how to spend sidesteps both, and it solves the taste problem at the same time: one person turns it into a Tesco shop, another into a Ticketmaster booking.

Use the Small Benefit Exemption properly, not just once

The exemption covers up to five benefits per employee per tax year with a combined value capped at €1,500. Only the first five count, in the order they are given, and a single benefit above €1,500 is taxable in full rather than on the excess. The benefit must be non-cash, must not be redeemable for cash in whole or in part, and must not form part of a salary sacrifice arrangement. Five slots is enough to mark a work anniversary, a project delivery and a year-end without touching payroll once.

Deliver where people already are

Instant delivery is not a nice-to-have when the recipient is not in the room. An OptionsCard can go by email, SMS or a PDF you print and hand over, and it can be scheduled with the Send Later feature so a reward lands on the right morning rather than whenever the order was processed. It sits in Apple or Google Wallet with a live balance, and there is no app to install and no registration, which matters more than people expect when you are asking someone to accept a work reward on a personal phone.

Make the moment visible

An office reward comes with a small piece of theatre attached: the mention at stand-up, the round of applause by the kettle. Remote staff get the transaction without the recognition. Rebuild some of it. Every OptionsCard has its own unwrap page and carries a message, a free video and your logo, so what lands says who it is from and why. Say the same thing in the team channel that day.

Where remote reward programmes go wrong

• Rewarding visibility rather than work: in a hybrid team the people a manager physically sees get thanked more often. Tie recognition to specific outcomes and the bias mostly disappears.
• Letting the office keep a second budget: on-site social spend that remote colleagues cannot access is a reward programme with a geography test attached. Either extend it or fund a parallel line.
• Saving everything for December: one large gesture at year end is the easiest thing to administer and the weakest thing to receive. The five-benefit structure exists so you can spread it.
• Choosing a card that behaves like cash: a prepaid card that can be used at an ATM, or cashed out in part, fails the non-cash condition and takes the exemption with it. Ask the provider the narrow question: can any part of this balance be turned into cash?
• Forgetting the filing: Enhanced Reporting Requirements apply to exempt benefits as well as taxable ones. The date and value go to Revenue through ROS on or before the day the benefit is given, not at year end.

OptionsCard suits this shape of team. Recipients swap the value for gift cards from a catalogue of over 70 Irish and international brands, so it can only reach goods and services. There are no fees on either side, the balance holds its value for five years, and business customers can order up to €25,000 online against an invoice, send in bulk and pull tax reporting files monthly or annually.

Figures here are correct as at August 2026 and tax treatment shifts with each Budget. Confirm the current position with your accountant before a large rollout.

Ready to reward a team that is not all in one place? Sign up at app.optionscard.ie/register and send your first rewards by email or SMS in a few minutes. If you would rather talk through how it fits your payroll and reporting first, email us at sales@optionscard.ie.