BANK ON A BREAK

IF your employer’s budgets aren’t growing — or worse, are shrinking — it is going to be pretty difficult to get a pay rise,

It may be that your boss wants to bump up your income, but simply can’t: she or he just doesn’t have extra money in the kitty for you.

But is cash the only workplace benefit that has value for you?

For example, how does an extra two weeks a year of holiday sound?

Getting an increase from four weeks’ leave to six is equivalent to a 4 per cent pay rise.

As long as you take the extra break time and don’t accumulate it, there is no added cost to your employer.

It doesn’t put extra cash in your hand at the end of the month or year, but it is valuable.

And when times improve for your employer, you could always trade it away for a pay increase.

Another bargaining chip I’ve used to get most of my increases is a rival offer. If you are a valued employee, your boss will not want to lose you.

It’s the equivalent of threatening to take your business to another bank offering a better rate. And as we showed in the first of these guides, that’s a very effective weapon for getting better terms.

But just as was the case with the mortgage negotiation, the threat to leave has to be real.