Draft guidance on how to manage gender pay reporting in the private and voluntary sectors has been produced by the Government and ACAS. It can be found here.

The aim of the guidance is to help employers meet their duties under the new gender pay gap reporting obligations, which were brought in by the Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017 (The Regulations). The Regulations are due to be brought into force on 6 April, and provide that employers with at least 250 employees must calculate and report the difference between men’s and women’s average hourly pay.

The guidance sets out four steps which employers should follow to ensure compliance with the new Regulations, namely:

  1. Extract the ‘essential information’ (i.e. the pay, bonuses and weekly working hours) of its male and female employees
  2. Carry out the calculations necessary to assess the (mean and median) gender pay gap
  3. Make a supporting statement to confirm that the published information is accurate; and
  4. Publish the gender pay information.

It also sets out a fifth step, which is does not specifically relate to an obligation under the Regulations, but is considered by both the Government and ACAS to be ‘best practice’:

  1. Implement plans to manage the gender pay gap, for instance, developing initiatives to encourage female mentoring and development.

If you would like further information on this article, or have any Employment Law queries, please contact Probert Legal Limited – solicitors based in Exeter covering Devon, Cornwall and the rest of UK.