SME Welfare Platform, 4,600 Companies Joined in 4 Months

Source=Ministry of SMEs and Startups

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Daeseop] The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced on the 12th that since the launch of the 'SME Welfare Platform,' 4,600 companies and 60,650 members have joined.

The SME Welfare Platform was launched in September last year. It is a platform jointly established with the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry to improve the welfare of SME workers. Within four months, it exceeded the initial target of 1,000 companies at launch. So far, there have been 9,143 orders through the welfare platform, totaling 400 million KRW in order amount.

The Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, through one year of preliminary preparations including domestic and international case studies and service demand surveys targeting SMEs, selected welfare products in five categories: leisure & travel, hobbies & self-development, health management, life stability, and product malls. These welfare products, provided by 21 companies, are offered to SME employees at the lowest market prices or at discounted rates.

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups and the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry plan to implement various policies such as planning and discovering new welfare services and inducing welfare investment in SMEs. They will discover new services and expand the number of service providers to 50. To provide region-specific specialized services, they plan to open regional special halls.

Additionally, SMEs that provide welfare points to their workers will be designated as performance-sharing companies to encourage voluntary welfare investment by SMEs. In collaboration with the Ministry of Employment and Labor, they will activate the establishment of joint labor welfare funds and select necessary welfare services for each joint fund to provide customized packages.

To spread a win-win welfare model between large corporations and SMEs, they will also collaborate with the Win-Win Growth Committee. They will promote cases where large corporations and their SME partners jointly raise funds and provide welfare points to the workers of partner companies.

The SME Welfare Platform can be used by SMEs without any separate registration or usage fees. Registration applications can be made on the SME Welfare Platform website. When the company's welfare officer submits the required documents such as business registration certificate and SME confirmation certificate, registration approval is granted within 24 hours.

After approval, when the company inputs employee information, individual IDs are issued to employees, allowing them to freely use the SME Welfare Platform.

Park Young-sun, Minister of SMEs and Startups, said, "Improving worker welfare is the responsibility of companies, but it is necessary for the government to play a minimum catalytic role for SMEs facing difficult management conditions," adding, "We expect the SME Welfare Platform to fulfill such a role."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.