As from 1st October 2016, employers with 250 employees or more will be expected to comply with new gender reporting requirements, with the first report being required by no later than 30th April 2018.
The Equality Act (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2016 were published on 12th February and sets out employer obligations in respect of reporting requirements. In short, employers will be expected to:
• publish information on their website each year
• leave such information on their website for a period of 3 years
• upload the same information to a government website
• have a director or partner to sign off the data
As per the title, employers will be required to publish information relating to the pay (and bonus pay) of employees for the purposes of showing whether there are differences in the pay of male and female employees. Employers will also be required to publish details of how many women and men are employed in each quartile of the employer’s pay distribution.
Of course the aim of the new regulations is to close the inequality of pay which, sadly, still exists between men and women. By forcing larger organisations to disclose this information to the public, the intention is to expose organisations who are not taking steps to tackle any inequalities which exist.
Failure to Comply
As with the National Minimum Wage ‘name and shame’ approach, employers have been warned the same will apply following a failure to comply with the reporting requirements.
In addition to the above ‘naming and shaming’, the Government has warned that employers could possibly face civil or possibly criminal sanction for non-compliance.
The first report does need to be reported for another 2 years so if you do have inequality of pay within your organisation, now is your time to make changes before someone else points out your disparities.
If you would like advice please contact our Employment team.
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