Microsoft employees to receive a $1,500 pandemic bonus

[midian182]

In brief: The Covid-19 crisis has been a challenging time for everyone. As such, several tech giants have gifted their employees a pandemic bonus. One of these is Microsoft, which is handing workers $1,500 "in recognition of the unique and challenging fiscal year that Microsoft just completed."

In an internal memo seen by The Verge, Microsoft's chief people officer, Kathleen Hogan, announced that all staff below the level of vice president that started on or before March 31st, 2021, will be eligible for the bonus. That includes part-time workers and those on hourly rates in both the US and internationally who are eligible.

"As a symbol of our appreciation for coming together as One Microsoft during a uniquely challenging year, we are proud to recognize our employees with a one-time monetary gift," a Microsoft spokesperson told CNET.

Despite Microsoft owning LinkedIn, GitHub, and ZeniMax, employees at those companies are not eligible for the bonus. With 175,508 workers worldwide, the gifts are expected to cost the Windows maker around $200 million. That's a lot of money but represents just two days' worth of profit for Microsoft, which last month became only the second US public company to hit a $2 trillion market value, joining Apple in a very exclusive club.

Microsoft isn't the only firm to hand out a pandemic-related bonus. Facebook gave its staff $1,000 cash in March 2020 to help during the coronavirus outbreak; Amazon's frontline workers received a $300 holiday bonus; UK telecoms company BT is gifting $2,000 to its 60,000 employees; and Twitter said it would reimburse staff for the equipment they purchased to work from home, as well extra day care fees paid by those with children.

Image credits: The Art of Pics

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https://www.techspot.com/news/90366-microsoft-employees-receive-1500-pandemic-bonus.html

 

[SirDigby]

"UK telecoms company BT is gifting $2,000 to its 60,000 employees"

Correction, £500 of that £1,500 you're counting is awarded to every employee as share incentive, and was happening before the pandemic.
The other £1,000 is being given to all team member grade employees (~60,000) as a pandemic bonus, but all manager grade employees (~15,000+) (many of whom earn less than team members) had pay freezes and sub-par bonuses. The bonus target for managers at lowest levels is 10%, and is affected by personal performance and business performance - it absolutely does not work out that way.

Manager grade =/= people manager, includes 3rd line support, design, project managers, delivery managers etc.

 

[Lionvibez]

My company also gave me a $1000 Covid bonus which I was planning to use on a gpu upgrade and still sitting on that cash due to mining.

 

[Reehahs]

Nothing says that your company is part of Microsoft when it misses on these bonuses.

 

[Ermilyyyyyy]

For microsoft, it’s only for “regular” employees, that excludes a whole chunk of people!