Bonuses come back into fashion

Companies are using them to retain staff whom they regard as high-fliers, even though they may not have had a successful year in a quantifiable way, according to headhunter Odgers Ray & Berndtson, which compiled the survey.

Chris Manfield, a consultant, said: "Compensation is handled in completely different ways by different houses. But a number say they have recently increased the discretionary element for some staff.

"This is a change from a trend in the past few years, especially at US houses, to reward

increasingly according to performance." Performance awards look at measurable indicators for an individual and the team they work in, such as sales figures. The survey, which asked 12 fund managers how they paid their institutional sales and marketing staff in London, found that the salaries of employees with 10 years' experience or more generally ranged between 100,000 (€142,000) and 130,000.

Manfield said the figures had remained stable through the recent economic downturn. Bonuses of sales and marketing staff had fallen but not as much as those of portfolio managers. The survey showed total compensation for sales and marketing staff at third-tier houses rarely exceeds 220,000. At top-tier fund managers 250,000 is common and packages up to 700,000 were paid last year.