What's right for Christmas employee reward - physical gift cards, Amazon vouchers or eGift cards?

Amazon vouchers, physical gift cards and eGift cards all have their place but which is best for you? And when should you use them? That depends on how you need you deliver reward to, how personalised you want to make it and whether you need to send in bulk to thousands or just a few employees. Here is how each option works in practice so you can work out what’s best for your needs.

Physical gift cards

There's certainly something to be said for sending or handing someone an actual card. It's familiar and festive, and for a smaller team that simplicity and tangibility counts.

Like most things non-digital, however, the problems tend to occur when you start operating this method of reward delivery at scale, and not least because the admin of storing and distributing becomes a messy and expensive job when volumes climb.

In particular, distributing cards becomes a real challenge once you're dealing with multiple sites or a remote workforce. Cards can go missing in the office, in transit or arrive after someone's already left for the break.

You also need to consider that the choice you’re offering to your employees is going to be limited to whatever retailer you’ve chosen to buy physical cards from, which even in smaller teams isn’t going to suit everyone.

There's also no way to know whether someone's redeemed a card, so anything lost or unused simply disappears from your budget with no way to recover it.

Amazon vouchers

Amazon vouchers have an advantage over physical cards when you deliver them digitally. They reach your employees within minutes when you hit send, there's nothing physical to distribute, and many employees already know how to redeem one. For a fast and no-fuss send, that works.

The limitation is choice. A single retailer, however large, doesn't suit every employee. Maybe they’d have preferred to spend their reward on a night out at a restaurant, or a takeaway? Some people also don’t like to shop at Amazon for ethical reasons.

One of the biggest factors though is that there's little room for personalisation either. For employees, sending them a generic Amazon code can feel like you opted for the an impersonal option rather than something more considered which offers them a choice of retailers they love.

eGift cards

Delivery of eGift cards via a digital employee rewards delivery service is the best fit for most organisations sending employee Christmas gifts at scale.

When you send, delivery is instant to any device, making it easy for you to reach people whether they are in head office, work from home, or never sit at a desk. There's no physical logistics involved and nothing to go missing in transit.

It’s not just scale though. The process works as well whether you are distributing a single reward or thousands. Plus, you can use personalisation to add messages for individual or groups from their managers

The retailer range is another big differentiator. Instead of one option, employees typically get a choice to redeem their reward from many different, including the supermarkets and brands they typically want to use, or options for choices for dining out and food delivery

Another bonus is you get full visibility of what you’ve sent and what employees have redeemed, which means nothing gets lost in the year end rush, unspent value can come back automatically instead of expiring, and you can track redemption habits to check how your reward is landing and what people appreciate.

Making the call

If you want to learn more about the eGift card option, our guide on how to choose a bulk Christmas reward platform covers what you need to consider. For everything else on how to get your Christmas reward organised this year, visit our Christmas Employee Reward Hub.