PayPal Gives Employees Early Access To Paychecks Though Even’s App

PayPal employees will now be able to tap their earnings long before their paychecks officially hit their accounts in a deal with Even Responsible Finance, a startup founded to provide an alternative to high-cost payday lenders, PayPal announced Tuesday (Nov. 17).

Under the agreement, employees of the online payments giant will be able to use Even’s app free of charge to access their pay as they earn it, instead of waiting for payday every two weeks. They can also use the app’s other functions, such as automated savings and projections of earnings and expenses designed to help with budgeting.

PayPal decided to team up with Even after top executives at the firm came to the realization that the daily and weekly financial situation of their employees was considerably more tenuous than they realized.

Driving home that realization was the rush of employees who applied for help when PayPal set up an emergency relief fund to help provide assistance with unexpected expenses, such as car repairs, according to Bloomberg.

That prompted PayPal executives to survey their hourly and entry-level employees. The results were eye-opening: Workers at some offices said that after accounting for taxes and living expenses, just 4 percent of their paychecks remained.

Company executives were doubly surprised given that PayPal’s pay rates either match or exceed the market in regions across the world.

“They were financially stressed, they were being forced to choose between full health-care benefits and putting food on the table for their families,” CEO Dan Schulman told Bloomberg.

The onboarding of Even’s app comes atop a two-year push by PayPal to boost the pay and lower expenses such as healthcare for its hourly and entry-level employees.

By early next year, net disposable income for PayPal employees will have risen to 16 percent, according to the company.

“Over the past year, we’ve made significant investments to strengthen the financial health of our workforce,” Schulman said in a statement. “We’ve made substantial progress to increase the net disposable income of all our employees, and our work with Even will help drive further improvements.”