This business offers paid ‘Tinder leave’ and it’s as weird as it sounds

Workplaces across the globe are rolling out creative employee benefits. But one marketing agency has gone a step further, by paying for staff to go on Tinder dates.

Whiteline Group in Thailand is the business, and it’s calling this unique perk ‘paid Tinder leave’. The move aims to boost staff wellbeing; a logic that may draw scepticism from anyone who has tried online dating today.

The marketing agency may simply be after some positive PR from the announcement. But the policy also says a lot about just how far companies are willing to go to improve morale and employee engagement in an increasingly detached work culture.

Tinder Leave

Launched in 2012, Tinder has become one of the world’s best-known dating apps. Similar to holiday entitlement or sick leave, workers at Whiteline Group will be given paid time off during the workday in order to pursue romantic connections established on the app.

According to the agency’s LinkedIn page, Whiteline Group has made the perk available to its 200 staff members to use from mid-July until December.

It is unclear how many days off employees will be able to take (although one user has estimated that men and women will go on one Tinder tryst per month, on average).

Source: LinkedIn/Whiteline Group

The perk has apparently been introduced due to employee demand. One staff member reportedly complained she was too busy to date, says the New York Post. In response, the company’s leadership decided to introduce Tinder Leave.

As well as being able to clock in and out of the office job, Whiteline has also pledged to purchase six-month long Tinder Gold and Tinder Platinum subscriptions for all its staff, to give those who are unlucky in love a better chance at being able to use the perk.

One Whiteline employee has already shared a video on TikTok explaining how she used the perk to go on a date during the day. She and her partner took a walk in the park, where he then fed her watermelon on a skewer. Well, they can’t all be winners.

Tinder Aid

A recent survey of Gen Zers who use dating apps found that 90% feel frustrated with the time they spend on the apps, versus what they see as poor pay off. Perhaps Tinder leave will help by giving employees time back to pursue romantic interests.

That appears to be Whiteline’s thinking. If employees can use the app to find “the one”, they will feel happier and more motivated at work, and their output will increase as a result.

Organisations are increasingly taking stock of how their employees are feeling in today’s business climate. Awareness is growing around how poor mental health can cause workers to engage in presenteeism, defined as doing performative work despite being unproductive.

In the UK, this engagement crisis has become so prevalent it has a name: The Great Detachment. Some studies have even estimated that, in firms where a culture of presenteeism takes hold, one day in every working week could be lost to poor productivity.

Paying for staff to go on a candlelit dinner is an extreme example of how companies are working to tackle the engagement crisis. But the ‘Tinder leave policy displays a level of ingenuity that some UK companies may feel inspired to emulate.

Love connection?

There is another, less romantic reason that Whiteline has unveiled this policy. As well as wanting its employees to forge new connections, it could also be trying to ‘match’ itself with prospective new workers as part of the world’s wackiest recruitment process.

Whiteline Group’s LinkedIn page shows that the company is currently hiring for 13 new roles. Offering eye-catching, unique perks can be a smart way for businesses to snare talent.

Research suggests that company benefits are becoming almost, or as, important as pay for job seekers. Whiteline’s Tinder leave policy has made headlines across nearly every continent, setting it apart from competitors and giving it a major boost in attracting top applicants.

Here in the UK, Office for National Statistics (ONS) data has found that half a million workers are currently out of the workforce. This drain on talent has left many firms struggling to plug hiring gaps and source the skills required for company growth.

In such a tight labour market, anything business owners can do to ensure that a candidate ‘swipes left’ on your company is worth taking note of.