A little more than a month after the parent company of First Tennessee Bank distributed one-time $1,000 bonuses to employees, the company is rolling out another employee perk.
Memphis-based First Horizon National Corp. is bumping up the minimum pay level of employees to $15 an hour, part of the company’s continued re-investment of savings stemming from the recent federal tax legislation.
The total cost to the company is about $6 million, which is in addition to the $1,000 bonuses and a recent $16.5 million contribution to the First Tennessee Foundation.
The company late in 2017 announced the one-time cash bonuses to 70 percent of its workforce, which stands at nearly 6,000 following its recent merger with Capital Bank. The company employs more than 4,100 across Tennessee.
The pay increases were for employees who were not already at or above the $15-an-hour level. That includes a little less than 200 employees in Memphis.
“First Horizon’s continued strong results are driven by the individual and collective efforts of all our employees,” Bryan Jordan, First Horizon’s chairman and CEO, said in a statement about the raises. “As a result of the recent tax reform, First Tennessee invested a portion of the tax savings back into our people and our communities to strengthen our business.”
The re-investment also follows First Horizon’s merger with Capital Bank, which closed on Nov. 30. The merger created the fourth largest regional bank in the Southeast, with about $41 billion in assets, $31 billion in deposits, $28 billion in loans and nearly 350 branches in Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, Georgia, Texas and Virginia.