Are inflation payrises not standard?

That is just terrible. All you do is build resentment from employees who know they are being taken advantage of. If it is an amazing place to work companies can get away with that for a while but at some point people realise they can earn 5k...10k...20k+ more elsewhere doing the exact same thing. What always frustrated me the most was seeing jobs advertised and seeing the salary range. Then suddenly the question always became what do you earn now. Almost without fail the hiring company would then try to get away offering as little as possible above your current salary ignoring market rate. It means it can actually be hard to move for what you should be paid. This does seem to be happening less in the last few years though in my industry at least. I remember an issue once with a team I oversaw. They brought on a new employee to the team. The salary was the same but when it came to bonus time HR suggested 25%. For the rest of the team it was all based on what they got last year (6-8%). I spoke to the manager and we moved some of her bonus to the others in the team. I was pulled in by HR to ask why I halved her bonus. I asked them, so you are telling me the bonus for the job should be 25% as that is what you have applied to her but the guys who have been here for years are getting 8% max. So can I assume you're happy to go away and adjust them all.up to 25% as you are saying that is what they should be getting. I didn't hear from HR again on the topic. All of that team had left the company within a couple of years.