As National Carers Week 2025 (9-15 June) comes to a close, new research reveals 38% of employers believe that stress and anxiety related to home life, such as having caring responsibilities, is affecting their staff. Twenty-nine per cent of all employers also say that a lack of state-funded social care is causing pressure on employees, and that employers themselves need to provide support to help those employees who have caring responsibilities.

Whether due to mental or physical ill-health or disability, caring can take a huge toll on the carer’s life in terms of their finances, work, relationships and their own health – both in the short and the long term. GRiD commends employers for stepping up and supporting their staff when their home life becomes complex due to caring responsibilities.

Challenges of supporting carers

Supporting employees with caring responsibilities can be challenging due to the unpredictability of caregiving. Staff with dependants often need greater flexibility and can feel a tension between their personal and private lives, which, without support from their employer, can potentially lead to absence. Additionally, there can be stigma or a lack of understanding from colleagues and management.

Employers who want to support carer-employees may not know how to, and often fear that doing so, will mean they are not treating all staff equally. In addition, employers can’t be expected to be qualified to offer support directly themselves, which is why providing employee benefits with support for dependants is mutually beneficial to staff and the employing organisation.

How can employee benefits help?

Employers can start by ensuring they have a written statement in a company handbook which sets out how they promote an inclusive and supportive workplace, that helps ensure fair treatment for their carer-employees. Employee benefits, including employer-sponsored life assurance, income protection and critical illness, can also be utilised to provide in-the-moment support and give access to specialists. This can include advice on issues such as challenges that a dependant (whether that be a child or adult) may be facing, information on specific health conditions and treatments, support with assessments and second opinions, through to advice on arranging eldercare.

Katharine Moxham, spokesperson for GRiD said: “Important as it is, support for carers is rarely top of the wish list when it comes to employee benefits, however, many employers will find that their employee benefits already have a wide range of support aimed at this group. This type of support is expanding all the time, so even those employers who believe they have a good grasp of what is available may find that additional types of support may now be available.

“As well as helping carers support their dependants, carer-employees must also be encouraged to look after their own health, making the best use of everything available to them in their employee benefits programme.

“And, as not everyone who has caring responsibilities considers themselves to be a ‘carer’, or makes their responsibilities known to their employer, employers may not really know how many people in their employment are affected. Employers should assume the numbers are far greater than they realise and shape their employee benefits accordingly.”

Research from GRiD