Compensation & Benefits Specialist

Here at Harding+, we are recruiting for a Compensation & Benefits Specialist to join our growing HR team.

It’s a great time to join our team, as a growing and scaling retailer with a twist, working and innovating together helps us realise our purpose to ‘make every cruise better’. 

About the role:

As our Compensation & Benefits Specialist, you’ll work closely with our payroll provider to ensure every payment is accurate and on time. While taking ownership of the smooth, effective management of our employee benefits and incentive schemes for colleagues in our UK and USA hub offices, as well as our shipboard teams across the global fleet.

You will oversee processes from gathering and validating data, through to final processing, reporting, analytics, and communication working closely with our wider HR team, Finance, and operational colleagues to keep everything running seamlessly. Alongside this, you’ll build and maintain strong partnerships with service providers and vendors, ensuring our payroll, benefits, and incentive programmes are always compliant and efficient to deliver real value across multiple jurisdictions.

Based in Avonmouth on a hybrid working basis – 2 days per week in the office

Compensation – competitive salary, bonus scheme, pension, 4 x life assurance, healthcare cash plan, 26 days annual leave (plus the opportunity to buy an additional 5 days)

What you will be doing:

As our Compensation & Benefits Specialist, you’ll oversee our benefits and incentive schemes making sure they’re competitive and aligned with our business goals. From statutory reporting and audits to analysing data that shapes strategic decisions, you’ll ensure compliance to drive the effectiveness of our programmes.

You’ll manage expenses processes with precision, act as HR systems administrator for our Reward Gateway to maintain data integrity as well as building strong relationships with providers and internal stakeholders to keep service levels high.

Continuous improvement will be key, you’ll identify and deliver improvements in accuracy and cost-effectiveness, while also supporting on HR transformation projects that enhance our benefits, payroll systems, and incentive programmes.

About you:

• Proven experience partnering with third party payroll providers
• Experience managing benefits and incentive/commission schemes
• Strong understanding of compliance requirements, systems and best practice across all three areas
• Excellent attention to details and strong numerical skills
• Strong analytical skills with the ability to interpret complex compensation and benefits data
• Skilled in vendor and stakeholder management
• Demonstrated ability to identify and deliver process improvements
• Strong communication skills, able to explain complex information clearly to non-specialist audiences

Key Attributes – trust, collaboration, respect, passion, drive, resilience

About us:

Harding+ is the only 100% dedicated cruise retailer, proudly partnering with 12 cruise line operators globally, across more than 80+ cruise ships either in operation or under contract. Our mission is simple: make every cruise better. We operate over 300 retail shops across 80+ ships, covering 17,000m² of retail space and handling 6.6 million transactions annually.  

Our team includes over 1,300 onboard team members and more than 270 landside employees, we stay at the forefront of retailing and consistently provide outstanding customer service, culminating in winning the Cruise Retailer of the Year award for 2022 and 2023. 

Harding+ is an equal opportunities employer.  We believe passionately that employing a diverse workforce is central to our success.  We make recruiting decisions based on your experience and skills.  We value your passion to discover, invent, simplify, and build.  Protecting your privacy and the security of your data is a longstanding top priority for Harding+. 

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