Clinics That Pay Bonuses Somehow Keep Fewer Staff, Says 2026 Barometer

HMDG's 2026 UK Private Practice Barometer found that clinics offering staff bonuses had higher turnover than clinics that didn't bother, which is the sort of thing that makes you put your tea down. This includes practices like yours, assuming yours has staff and a payroll spreadsheet you dread opening.

Page updated: 13 Aug 2026

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Clinics hoping a bonus scheme will glue their team in place should know the numbers say otherwise, at least on this evidence.

Original Research	A benchmarking survey of UK clinic owners found bonus schemes correlated with more staff leaving, not less.
Source	https://hmdg.co.uk/private-practice-barometer/
Overview	The Barometer surveyed 715 UK MSK clinic owners on pay, pricing and staff retention, and HMDG published the results as an industry benchmarking report.
Year	2026
Publisher	Industry body, HMDG
Relevance to Wellbeing	Directly relevant to any clinic weighing up staff incentives against actual retention, which is most of them.
Our Verdict	Too early to tell the numbers are real but the reasons behind them aren't spelled out, so don't rewrite your HR policy off one stat.
Our Summary	A decent sample size, 715 clinics, so it's not just three people moaning in a WhatsApp group. It gives clinic owners permission to stop assuming cash is the only lever worth pulling. Correlation, not causation. Bonuses might be a symptom of a wobbly clinic rather than the cause of the wobble. No detail on bonus size, structure, or what else those clinics were doing differently.
Our Geo View	Applies broadly, though the underlying data is UK-specific and pay norms elsewhere may differ.

Abstract of wellbeing niches and revenue flow

Recognise how this might impact your practice

Why this might matter to you

Coaching: this matters because if you ever take on associates, throwing money at them won't fix a schedule nobody can bear.
Therapy: this matters because burnt-out therapists don't stay for a bonus, they stay for a manageable caseload.
Training: this matters because trainers running a small team might find flexible hours do more than a Christmas payout ever will.
Alternative Healing: this matters because practitioners sharing a space often stay for the culture of the place, not the extras bolted onto it.
Clinical: this matters because MSK and clinical practices are exactly who this survey studied, so the finding lands closest to home.
Retreat/Centre: this matters because centres juggling several staff members might be spending on bonuses when the actual leak is workload or autonomy.

Where this came from

HMDG asked over seven hundred UK clinic owners about pay, pricing and how long their staff tend to stick around, then published the findings as a yearly benchmark.

HMDG, UK Private Practice Barometer 2026. Published directly by HMDG, no paywall.

Credibility flags: survey-based, 715 respondents, methodology not fully disclosed beyond sample size, industry body publisher.

How we scored this

A relevance score out of 100, built from three things: how well it fits the six practice types, how recent it is, and how solid the methodology behind it is.

93%

Practice fit, 100How new, 100How solid, 75

Marked down slightly on how solid the method is, since the survey doesn't explain how bonus schemes were defined or measured, but scored well on how directly it fits clinical practices and on how recent the data is.

It's worth considering changes to your marketing practices

What this means for your marketing

Say culture before pay if a prospective hire asks why they should join you.
Put your actual staff tenure on your About page if it's good, since numbers beat adjectives.
Brief your team on the fact that bonuses aren't the whole retention story, so nobody feels short-changed if you don't run one.
Mention flexible scheduling or workload caps in job ads before you mention any bonus scheme.
Hold off promising a bonus scheme as a fix until you've asked your own staff what actually keeps them.

Who this is most useful for

Practice type	Relevance	Recommended action
Coaching	Low	Note it, but focus retention efforts elsewhere.
Therapy	Medium	Check workload and autonomy before adding financial perks.
Training	Medium	Prioritise scheduling flexibility over one-off payments.
Alternative Healing	Medium	Invest in shared culture over cash incentives.
Clinical	High	Review any existing bonus scheme against actual turnover figures.
Retreat/Centre	High	Audit staff workload and autonomy before expanding bonus spend.

Best before

Best before: revisit when HMDG publish the next annual Barometer, or sooner if you're about to design a bonus scheme and want fresher numbers.

Consider This The Footnote That Changes Things.

You stayed to the end and here we both are. We have a visual river, a story garden and a listening wind that belong to a practice exactly like yours - and a discovery call where they all make beautiful sense over coffee. Biscuit?

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