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Ensure Transparency & Fairness in Your Workplace

Each year, employers with 250 or more members of staff are legally required to undertake gender pay gap reporting and publish their findings both on their own website and on the government’s website.

The report relies on payroll data from one set day, known as the snapshot date. Most public authority employers must use the snapshot date of 31st March, whereas private, voluntary, and all other public authority employers must use the snapshot date of 5th April. All required employers must publish their gender pay gap report within one year of that date.

Accompanying your findings, expressed as a percentage (such as female employees, on average, earn X% less than their male counterparts), can be a supporting narrative, which might explain the reason for a gap, and an action plan that highlights what steps you are taking to eliminate the gap. Both of these additional documents are discretionary.

Failure to publish your gender pay gap report could result in reputational damage. That’s because the gender pay gap service applies a prominent ‘late’ tag to your company’s name on its public database. Because reporting is a legal requirement for employers with 250 or more employees, you could also face fines and court proceedings if you publish misleading figures or fail to publish them at all.

How Loch can help

The experienced team at Loch have been helping organisations with their gender pay gap reporting long before it became a mandatory requirement in 2017.

We can help you to gather the data, draft a supporting narrative and an action plan, publish and upload the report to your website and the government portal. Ultimately, we can, where necessary and applicable, provide guidance on how you can tangibly reduce your gender pay gap.

Perhaps you are just crossing the threshold of 250 employees, and it’s your first time completing a report. We can help you every step of the way.

Whatever your situation, Loch is here to help.

Is gender pay gap reporting a legal requirement?

Gender pay gap reporting is a legal requirement for all employers with 250 or more members of staff on their snapshot date. Failure to do so could result in reputational damage and legal action.

If you are an employer with fewer than 250 employees, publishing a pay gap report is strongly recommended to illustrate your progressive stance on equality in the workplace.

What is the deadline for gender pay gap reporting?

The deadline for gender pay gap reporting is 364 days after your snapshot date – the date on which your payroll data is taken. For most public authority employers, the snapshot date is 31st March, and the deadline is 30th March. For private, voluntary and all other public authority employers, the snapshot date is 5th April with a deadline of 4th April.

What is the difference between equal pay and the gender pay gap?

While both concepts deal with income disparity, the two are not the same. Equal pay means that both male and female members of staff must be equally compensated for equal work.

That goes for hourly pay, holiday entitlement and pension contributions, among many other factors. The gender pay gap, on the other hand, takes into account all roles across the organisation which can reveal a disparity, such as more women fulfilling lower-paid roles.

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