Employee Benefit Plan (Notes)

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2017

Compensation and Employee Benefit Plans, Other than Share-based Compensation [Text Block]


15.	Employee Benefit Plans

We maintain a defined contribution retirement plan (“401(k) plan”) for our U.S. employees that provides for a matching contribution by us. All full time U.S. employees are eligible to participate in the 401(k) plan. Our U.K. credit card subsidiary offers eligible employees membership in a Group Personal Pension Plan which is set up with Friends Provident. This plan is a defined contribution plan in which all permanent employees who have completed 3 months of continuous service are eligible to join the plan. Company matching contributions are available to U.K. employees who contribute a minimum of 3% of their salaries under our Group Personal Pension Plan and to U.S. employees who participate in our 401(k) plan. We made matching contributions under our U.S. and U.K. plans of $272,005 and $307,361 in 2017 and 2016, respectively.

Also, all employees, excluding executive officers, are eligible to participate in the ESPP. Under the ESPP, employees can elect to have up to 10% of their annual wages withheld to purchase our common stock up to a fair market value of $10,000. The amounts deducted and accumulated by each participant are used to purchase shares of common stock on or as promptly as practicable after the last business day of each month. The price of stock purchased under the ESPP is approximately 85% of the fair market value per share of our common stock on the purchase date. Employees contributed $35,593 to purchase 16,954 shares of common stock in 2017 and $28,541 to purchase 11,053 shares of common stock in 2016 under the ESPP. The ESPP covers up to 150,000 shares of common stock. Our charge to expense associated with the ESPP was $22,590 and $16,930 in 2017 and 2016, respectively.