As part of our ongoing Copart Cares 💙CSR strategy, one of our key areas of focus is our commitment to fostering relationships with our teammates and building a caring culture of trust, honesty, and transparency.
Helping us to provide an open, safe, and fair and environment where our teammates can thrive, are a set of social responsibilities which we adhere to and also encourage our partners, stakeholders, and suppliers to align with.
Gender Pay Gap
The publication of our annual Gender Pay Gap Report enables us to demonstrate our commitment to encouraging diversity within our recruitment practices.
We are confident that our approach to hiring new employees and the provision of pay and rewards is not biased to one gender over another, and that men and women are paid equally for doing equivalent jobs across all areas of our business.
Copart UK has 15 Operation Centres throughout the UK, Â a Head Office and Customer Excellence Centre both based in Bedford, and three sites for our sister companies U-Pull-It and CashforCars.
Job roles are broadly split into four different categories: qualified LGV Drivers, Yard Operatives, admin staff, and functional specialists, so we have a good mix of roles to appeal to everyone.
Real Living Wage
We care about the wellbeing of our teammates and believe that everyone deserves to earn a salary that meets their basic everyday living needs, so we are currently working towards becoming a Real Living Wage Employer.
By voluntarily paying the Real Living Wage, we will be joining forces with over 7,000 UK businesses who understand the importance of paying employees a wage which is enough to live on.
Not only is it the right thing to do, but it will also help us to attract and retain great people. Of course, we want to be seen as an Employer of Choice, but more than that we want our teammates to know that we care about them, and this is just one tangible way for us to demonstrate that.
Modern Slavery Act
We are committed to constantly reviewing our employment practices, and the activities of our supply chain, to ensure compliance with the Modern Slavery Act 2015.Â
Although we have completed a risk assessment against our activities and concluded that we do not have any area subject to high risk within the definition of the Act, this is reviewed annually and updated as necessary.
Our Copart Values are an integral part of the way we operate and, along with our Employee Handbook, provide an ethical framework for the behaviours we expect from our teammates, customers, partners, and suppliers.
Alongside a comprehensive set of policies and procedures, which includes recruitment and contract approval practices, we’ve also embedded our Copart Cares CSR strategy into our culture, which focuses on caring about customers, communities, charitable causes, and the environment.
Diversity & Inclusion
We value our diverse workforce, and we champion fair opportunities for everyone.
Any new job applicants – or current teammates seeking career progression – will receive equal treatment regardless of age, gender, disability, pregnancy or maternity, race, colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin, religion, or sexual orientation.
To ensure that this commitment is further embedded into our culture, equal opportunity awareness is embedded into all the policies, procedures and training which our managers follow, and we expect them to lead by example at all times.
We are committed to providing a working environment where all our teammates and customers feel safe and are treated (and treat others) with dignity and respect. We have a zero-tolerance approach to bullying or harassment in the workplace.
Health & Wellbeing
We’re proud to work closely with the automotive charity Ben to ensure that our teammates experiencing physical or mental health issues have access to independent and confidential advice, alongside our own support services. Â
And in our efforts to encourage an open and supportive working culture, over 125 managers across our business have undertaken specialist mental health awareness training to help them identify and support teammates who might be struggling.
We are also currently in the process of launching Mental Health First Aider training across the business.
Employee Voice
Whistle-Blower Service
We want our people to know that we always put them first, so we’ve worked hard to establish a caring culture built around trust and respect, where everyone’s voice can be heard.
As part of our wider corporate governance goals to act in the right and responsible way, we have an anonymous whistle-blower service available to our teammates, making it easy to disclose information without fear of retaliation.
Teammates are encouraged to provide information about theft, fraud, stealing of confidential information, or any other inappropriate business practices, without judgement and in complete confidence. The hotline and email address are well publicised through our Employee Handbook and other internal communications.
Communication & Feedback Tools
Our teammates receive regular ‘one-to-ones’ and performance reviews, to encourage two-way communication and provide personal development plans, enabling them to be the best that they can be.
We also run Coaching Clinics, where teammates share their area of expertise in the business with others.
We appreciate that providing honest and open feedback can be daunting, so we also perform regular anonymous Teammate Surveys to help us identify areas where we may need to improve.
A further independent feedback survey is also performed with selected teams every year as part of our CCA Global Standard re-accreditation process, providing valuable external validation.
Early next year, we’re launching a new self-service HR platform, which will include a number of tools to enable teammates to submit ideas, make suggestions, and provide constructive feedback to our senior management team.
“Putting our teammates first is one of the most important elements of our Copart Cares CSR strategy. It’s the amazing dedication, hard work and camaraderie of our people that makes us the success we are today.
It’s vital that we always act in the right and most responsible way, and provide the necessary support network, working environment, and communication channels for our teammates to feel valued and protected.
We’re proud to have built a caring culture of respect and trust at Copart, with an open-door approach where our teammates’ voices can be heard, and they can feel confident in challenging situations or suggesting ways we can improve and do things better.”
Jane Pocock – Managing Director of Copart UK & Ireland