bonus any one ?

If your RA is with Liberty, ask for stats growth vs contribution vs fees asked ! (Hope your RA stats look better than what mine did taking it over a 8 year period ! )
 
Got a decent bonus. About 250% of monthly in cash and about 300% of monthly in long term incentives (shares).

As usual the tax man took most of it (or will at some point in the future in the case of the shares). Still, feel really grateful to even be getting decent bonuses as many people I know have not seen one in years.

Pumping most of my bonus into savings for medical/school fees with some going towards an urgently needed extension on our garage.
 
Cius said:
Got a decent bonus. About 250% of monthly in cash and about 300% of monthly in long term incentives (shares).

As usual the tax man took most of it (or will at some point in the future in the case of the shares). Still, feel really grateful to even be getting decent bonuses as many people I know have not seen one in years.

Pumping most of my bonus into savings for medical/school fees with some going towards an urgently needed extension on our garage.
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Interesting. I haven't heard of shares being offered as incentives in SA before (very common in US based companies). As a matter of interest, does it take the same form? (usually a four year vesting schedule with a "leave and you lose it agreement").
 
Some of these posts make me want to quit and get a new damn job!

Only problem is I kind of enjoy my job, but where does one draw the line between what you enjoy and selling yourself at the price you think you're worth.

My company doesn't pay bonuses at all!
 
cguy said:
Interesting. I haven't heard of shares being offered as incentives in SA before (very common in US based companies). As a matter of interest, does it take the same form? (usually a four year vesting schedule with a "leave and you lose it agreement").
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Its actually reasonably common, especially in light of BEE legislation.

Bit different from the US in that its not officially structured into the offer you get. i.e. You might not hear about it till you're actually employed. Or its used to reward star performers.

As for vesting - most I saw had vesting schedules (longer than 4 years though), one had instant vesting of full allocation. Don't recall what the exit clauses were...

In most case there was little/no contractual entitlement to shares - so more of a bonus type thing that upper management decides unilaterally.
 
HavocXphere said:
Its actually reasonably common, especially in light of BEE legislation.

Bit different from the US in that its not officially structured into the offer you get. i.e. You might not hear about it till you're actually employed. Or its used to reward star performers.

As for vesting - most I saw had vesting schedules (longer than 4 years though), one had instant vesting of full allocation. Don't recall what the exit clauses were...

In most case there was little/no contractual entitlement to shares - so more of a bonus type thing that upper management decides unilaterally.
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Thanks. I wonder about those exit clauses though - have "golden handcuffs" officially arrived in SA? (I realize that this isn't limited to shares but also applies to deferred cash bonuses, options, etc.). I've always found the dynamics of this interesting - for some people it works, because they can't bare to walk away from their deferred rewards, but for others (myself included), it provides incentive to move to a company that offers less (ideally no) deferment, because they don't want to get in too deep.
 
Necuno said:
weee its paid in; must say allot more than i thought its going to be - nice R9000.00 bonus :) (...this is now after the tax was deducted)

now to see what % raise its going to be...
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I can't wait for my 13th cheque... Will be renovating my house here and there
 
So got 20K coming my way from Tax returns. Don't know what to do with it.
 
YingYang said:
Some of these posts make me want to quit and get a new damn job!

Only problem is I kind of enjoy my job, but where does one draw the line between what you enjoy and selling yourself at the price you think you're worth.

My company doesn't pay bonuses at all!
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I wouldn't get too upset about it. Rather earn a R600k base, then R250k + 100% annual bonus. Since the base pay in this thread is unknown, all we really know about is structure. Structure is important though - high percentage bonuses usually means that wealth is more closely related to personal performance - it is interesting to see what is in play in the market today.
 
cguy said:
Interesting. I haven't heard of shares being offered as incentives in SA before (very common in US based companies). As a matter of interest, does it take the same form? (usually a four year vesting schedule with a "leave and you lose it agreement").
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I only got my first shares when I reached management level. I work for a listed company that has shares obviously (one of the big 4 banks).

The system is fairly simple. They give you a rand amount of shares with a 3 year vestment period. Half the shares are guaranteed if you stay with the company for the 3 years and half of the shares are dependant on company performance. You however get dividends on both sets for the entire period and those dividends are fairly awesome as they are not taxed heavily and are like mini bonuses twice a year. I currently get about 15k twice a year in dividends which is an awesome bailout for me financially.

Once the shares reach maturity you can chose to sell them, sell just enough to pay tax, or keep them all and pay the tax out of other funds. Due to the fact that 50% of the shares are fairly hard to get due to it requiring 3 years of continual stretch goals being met generally the capital payout after tax is fairly minimal but it is still some cash. My shares are not looking great right now due to the recent plummet of all the bank shares due to the ratings downgrade threat. I have shares coming free next year and I got those shares at a price of around 230 I think and they are now worth 180. The payout would be a whole lot better if the share price had cone up a bit in the 3 year period.

Anyways, then due to it being a bonus they get taxed at 41% I believe so it does get cut down massively. It is fairly motivational though as an employee to have a vested interest in the company performing well. Since I got shares I find I check the share price often and use it as kind of a way to motivate myself daily to work effectively.
 
Cius said:
I only got my first shares when I reached management level. I work for a listed company that has shares obviously (one of the big 4 banks).

The system is fairly simple. They give you a rand amount of shares with a 3 year vestment period. Half the shares are guaranteed if you stay with the company for the 3 years and half of the shares are dependant on company performance. You however get dividends on both sets for the entire period and those dividends are fairly awesome as they are not taxed heavily and are like mini bonuses twice a year. I currently get about 15k twice a year in dividends which is an awesome bailout for me financially.

Once the shares reach maturity you can chose to sell them, sell just enough to pay tax, or keep them all and pay the tax out of other funds. Due to the fact that 50% of the shares are fairly hard to get due to it requiring 3 years of continual stretch goals being met generally the capital payout after tax is fairly minimal but it is still some cash. My shares are not looking great right now due to the recent plummet of all the bank shares due to the ratings downgrade threat. I have shares coming free next year and I got those shares at a price of around 230 I think and they are now worth 180. The payout would be a whole lot better if the share price had cone up a bit in the 3 year period.

Anyways, then due to it being a bonus they get taxed at 41% I believe so it does get cut down massively. It is fairly motivational though as an employee to have a vested interest in the company performing well. Since I got shares I find I check the share price often and use it as kind of a way to motivate myself daily to work effectively.
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Slightly different at the bank I work for. And actually changed in March. Used to be that you got a set number of shares (rather than Rand value) with no rights in respect thereof (voting, dividends etc.) until they vested. 75% after 4 years and 25% after 5 years. New system, you still get a set number of shares but you receive dividends on the shares prior to the options' vesting. Then 33% of the shares vest after 3 years, another 33% after 4 years and the remaining 34% after 5 years. In both cases, when the shares vest, you can choose to sell all the shares (then you get paid the value after tax), keep all the shares (and get smashed by the tax man when you file your return) or sell enough shares to cover the tax liability and keep the remaining shares. If you leave the bank at any time prior to vesting you lose the options.
 
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Interesting. Sorry, when I said rand value it gets converted to number of shares at the point of purchase. When I got the letter though it was rand value that on a specific date after that obviously gets converted to number of shares.

The amounts sounded impressive when I saw them but now that I have a better view of my final pay-out I am a bit less impressed with shares vs just cash bonus. We have an internal website that shows you your position and probability of getting the optional portion. For instance the first set of shares I got on paper said R100 000 which sounded like a lot of money. The current value of those share factoring in that there is currently only a 35% probability of me getting half of them is R35 500 after tax. This excludes the dividends I got over the past while though. If I add them I could add perhaps R11 000 to the total. Granted this is lower due to very poor share price performance due to reasons beyond our control but I now feel that if the company offered me R100K in shares or 100K cash up front I would take the cash as it is risk free.

Playing with my spreadsheet a bit I see that if you are willing to take the risk the shares can definitely work out better but that requires the company to hit the stretch targets 3 years running and for the share price to grow by a decent amount obviously. Had the share price on my 100K gone up 40% in 3 years (our previous trajectory) and I get the optional ones I could have cleared R100K post tax which is a lot better than the cash pre tax. Still, odds of that happening are not terrific in the current economic climate.
 
I'm at listed retailer, we get shares from management level. Similar structure as two posts above.
Shares earned in year 1, vest 33.3% in year 4, 33.3% in year 5 and 33.3% in year 6. So the payout only become decent from year 6 when you get the 3 x 33% from year 1, 2, and 3. We do get dividends on the unvested shares twice per year, but if you leave at anytime, you lose everything in the pot. You do lose quite a bit in devaluation since you earned it in year 1, until you get the last third in year 6, especially if the share price moved up less than inflation over that period of time.
 
Cius said:
Interesting. Sorry, when I said rand value it gets converted to number of shares at the point of purchase. When I got the letter though it was rand value that on a specific date after that obviously gets converted to number of shares.

The amounts sounded impressive when I saw them but now that I have a better view of my final pay-out I am a bit less impressed with shares vs just cash bonus. We have an internal website that shows you your position and probability of getting the optional portion. For instance the first set of shares I got on paper said R100 000 which sounded like a lot of money. The current value of those share factoring in that there is currently only a 35% probability of me getting half of them is R35 500 after tax. This excludes the dividends I got over the past while though. If I add them I could add perhaps R11 000 to the total. Granted this is lower due to very poor share price performance due to reasons beyond our control but I now feel that if the company offered me R100K in shares or 100K cash up front I would take the cash as it is risk free.
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Our's doesn't mention Rand value at all, its usually just a round number of shares (like 2000 or 4500).

Once you have received the options they are all yours provided you stay at the company so there isn't any optional portion.

Can work out pretty well, first set I got was worth about R70k on the date I was awarded them and I ended up getting about R110k when they vested. (The subsequent ones haven't done quite as well unfortunately).
 
Getting half our bonus now, other half in August(first time this has happened since I've started in 2012). Don't like this one bit, as I could have done a lot with all of it right now.
 
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