Cooley and Clifford Chance offer families fertility packages

Cooley has announced that it is offering all partners and staff £45,000 for fertility treatment as part of its new ‘family forming’ perk.

Magic circle law firm Clifford Chance has also revealed an extension to its health insurance, which will cover fertility treatment up to a cost of £15,000.

Both fertility packages will enable employees to receive thousands of pounds to help them start or grow a family. 

Earlier this year, Clifford Chance announced its partnership with Peppy, a digital healthcare and wellbeing platform available to support people “during major life transitions – menopause, fertility and parenthood” – whether they’re in the office or at home. The digital support app provides expert advice, resources and appointments. This will not only help employees going through difficult times but will also equip managers with a better understanding of their employees’ wellbeing.

Michael Bates, the UK managing partner at Clifford Chance emphasised that the firm’s inclusion strategy helps “to change the lived experience of our colleagues.”   

Meanwhile, Cooley, which has partnered with Carrot, has been offering this generous package to its US employees since October 2020. The package includes egg and sperm freezing, IVF, Intrauterine Insemination (IUI), adoption services and carrier support during pregnancy.

Sascha Grimm, a partner in its London office, said: “The firm supports all paths to parenthood.” The fertility package will give single men and women, including gay couples, the opportunity to become parents, with the financial backing of their employer. In addition to this scheme, the firm’s London office provides three months of paid parental leave for non-birthing parents. 

Nonetheless, Cooley and Clifford Chance are not the first to offer their lawyers with a fertility package; they follow in the footsteps of Allen & Overy which already offers its employees enhanced paternity leave and extra maternity leave for mothers of premature babies, including menopause treatment, and advice on early parenthood.

Just last week Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner revealed that it is offering a £15,000 ‘assisted fertility’ allowance in addition to personalised wellbeing support for those trying to conceive.

In 2018 Herbert Smith Freehills became the first large business in Britain to make gender transition surgery an employment perk, and a year later it launched a parental leave policy in Asia. 

While some may be enticed by such perks, critics have warned junior lawyers not to be easily lured because there’s always a catch. One of those critics is Dana Denis-Smith, founder of the legal services business Obelisk Support, who warned against making a “Faustian pact with the devil.”

She pointed out that such schemes are “headline-grabbing” but would be taken up by few people while costing the firm relatively little. Instead, she suggests law firms can render help to their employee’s fertility issues by providing “meaningful childcare support and enabling parental leave.” 

The pandemic has increased the focus on wellbeing, which has led firms to consider new ways to entice the new age of lawyers. However, the Law Society reminds law firms to consider the “wider systemic issues such as excessive workloads and billable hours expectations.”