Redeeming on-the-spot manager awards (InstantAwards™)

InstantAwards™ is a real-time manager-to-employee recognition solution, that enables managers to give monetary awards – in the form of instant shopping vouchers – to their team members, to reward great behavior.

Personalizing the reward experience

Receiving an InstantAward™ is an uplifting experience. It highlights the recognition of an employee's efforts, often initiated by their manager. The award comes with a personal message detailing why they received the award, which values they were demonstrating, or how this directly contributes to the success of the business.

Importantly, award recipients can then choose where to spend their award amount from a huge range of big name in-store and online retailers. Employees can purchase gift cards and vouchers on the platform, which can then be used to buy the items they wish.

Reward Gateway offers a huge amount of choice, meaning that an employee can always choose something of value to them and relevant to their life stage. For example, a graduate on their first job may have very different expectations of what ‘an award’ means to them than a family-focused employee raising their second child. Once the retailer is selected, their voucher is available to use straight away, removing any time or choice barriers to engagement and enabling an impactful gesture of appreciation.

Proactive alerts and instant redemption

As soon as an award has been sent, the employee will receive a congratulations email (see image below) and onsite alert. If they prefer not to be notified, they can adjust their alert settings through the Communication Preferences on their account.

The notification will prompt them to visit a landing page on the platform (see image below), where they can see their award and recognition message.

NOTE: The "Return to Social Recognition Wall" link will only appear on websites that have the Wall enabled. Awards will be visible to all users on the Wall if senders have chosen to make them public; if sent privately, they are only visible on the Wall to senders and recipients.

To make sure the award receiving experience is as smooth as can be, the monetary amount of the award is added to their recognition balance the moment the award is sent. This means that they'll find it on their account as soon as they log in to see the award, and can spend it at any time.

Watch the video below to see the full InstantAwards™ receiving journey.

Note: this is the standard award receiving process as of 19 September 2020. A small number of clients are still using a manual award claiming process, and should speak to their Client Success Manager for any questions about the steps involved.

Flexibility to spend awards at any time

Employees can see their recognition balance by selecting "See options" on the award landing page, or visiting their Account Settings page on the platform.

They will then be able to choose whether to spend all of their award immediately, part spend it, or leave the award value in their balance until they have accrued more awards. This allows them to build up a larger balance they can use for larger purchases.

Once ready, they can choose to redeem their award with multiple different retailers (depending on the country they are based in), helping to create a highly useful, relevant and beneficial experience for every single employee. 

Availability & Cost

InstantAwards™ can currently be used in the countries listed in this article: Which countries is SmartAwards™ available in?

SmartAwards™ is a chargeable product, and the only additional cost for InstantAwards™ is that of the shopping voucher awards themselves.  

More information

For InstantAwards™ pricing or activation inquiries, our Consultants, Account Managers, and Client Success Managers are here to help. Send us a message and we’ll respond within 24 hours.

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