In April, the Ministry for Labor indicated that the bill transposing EU Pay Transparency Directive provisions relating to categories of worker, equal work, right to information and gender pay gap reporting (reported in our article: Poland: Implementation of the EU Pay Transparency Directive moves closer) would not be enacted by June 7. Instead the government published a new bill on May 4, which is significantly different in some areas from the previous proposal.
Key provisions
- Implementation date: One of the most important issues is the introduction of a six-month vacatio legis (pause) in the entry into force of the regulations from the date of their publication in the Official Journal, missing the June 7 deadline for transposition
- Right to information: Annual and hourly remuneration information would be provided, calculated for the 12-month period preceding the month of submission of the application. The approach would be unique because in most countries, data are based on the past calendar year or a mix of current base salary and actual variable salary the calendar year prior. As a result, Polish employers would likely need to recalculate employee and company average salaries per gender and individual categories monthly
- Categorization of positions: Three levels of criteria would be established: mandatory (indicated by the directive), possible sub-criteria (related to mandatory criteria) and additional criteria. The same criteria would have to apply to all posts or all types of work. (The prior draft bill referred only to "criteria and sub-criteria" of the Labor Code without a clear distinction or mandate to apply the positions uniformly to the entire population.) The provision is contrary to the directive and common practice of employers where different groups of positions may be covered by different evaluation criteria
- Pay and benefits: Gross annual remuneration over the relevant 12-month period would be calculated on actual remuneration received excluding cash or in-kind benefits received by all employees (in the same amounts), termination-related payments and benefits from the Company Social Fund, applicable for gender pay gap reporting and right-to-information purposes. In contrast, hourly pay would be calculated on contracted hours (to reflect part-time working), not actual hours; therefore, employees who routinely work overtime would have proportionally higher hourly rates, if divided by the contractual number of working hours
- Gender pay gap reporting: Guidance on gender pay gap calculations would use a different formula for pay gap calculations compared with Eurostat and other EU regulations where the average salary of women is subtracted from the average salary of men, presenting a negative figure. The Polish approach would be based on the ratio of the difference between the average level of remuneration of women (SPWK) and the average level of remuneration of men (SPWM), with SPWM expressed as a percentage (i.e., SPWK – SPWM/SPWM x 100%), resulting in "positive" percentages showing how much more men earn, complicating international comparisons
The government also published explanatory guidance on calculating gender pay gaps. In brief, the draft bill and regulation would clarify definitions and rights of individual stakeholders in the process of ensuring equality and transparency of remuneration, but some preexisiting or new regulations in the bill may raise some questions or result in unfavorable solutions — both for employers and other parties. It is very likely that the proposed bill and regulations are not yet finalized and won't be implemented before the beginning of 2027. Employers should monitor the development of the bill and related regulations and prepare for implementation, including establishing the necessary data collection and reporting systems, to ensure compliance.
Contacts
