A Penny Saved

My wife and I just finished writing a Christmas letter with pictures of the girls at the bottom. I was able to take the letter to work and make 400 copies for a cost of only $40. As employees, we get to use the color copier for personal use and are only charged 10 cents a copy. That’s a great perk! It got me to thinking, what other perks do I get at work? Here are a few off the top of my head:

• Free food. Often there are activities at the church and food is left over. Yahoo! Helps the budget, but not necessarily my waist.
• Flexible hours. Being a pastor is not 8 to 5. Sometimes that means working evenings and Saturdays (and of course Sunday!). But it also means I can be flexible when I take a day off - like taking 1/2 day today so we could celebrate my youngest daughter’s fifth birthday.
• Church Mailbox’s. Our church has mailboxes for most of the families in the church. We use it for church business, but can also use it for personal correspondence. So those 400 letters - we didn’t have to mail 350 of them! That’s a savings of $143.50.
• High speed Internet. Where we live, cable is not available, but the church has it. So when I need to do some serious surfing, I head to the church.
• Babysitting. Being a pastor, my family gets many offers for free babysitting! And since our church does criminal background checks and some training, i know the children are in good hands.

I am sure I am missing some. What about your workplace? What perks do you get? I would love to hear from you.