Equal Pay Rights and Employer Accountability

How does the PTD affect recruitment?
Applicants must receive information about the initial pay or pay range early enough to support an informed negotiation. The figure must be based on objective, gender-neutral criteria.

Employers must use gender-neutral job titles and vacancy notices, conduct recruitment in a non-discriminatory way and must not ask applicants about their current or previous pay.

This is intended to prevent historic pay inequalities from being carried into a new role.

What must workers know about pay-setting?
Workers should be able to understand the criteria used to determine their pay, pay level and progression.

These criteria must be objective, gender-neutral and easily accessible. Member States may exempt employers with fewer than 50 workers from the requirement relating specifically to pay-progression criteria.

The aim is to make both the pay outcome and the reasoning behind it more transparent.

What pay information can workers request?
Workers can request their individual pay level and average pay levels, broken down by sex, for workers performing the same work or work of equal value.

Employers must remind workers of this right annually and provide the requested information in writing within two months. Requests may also be made through workers’ representatives or an equality body.

This information can help a worker assess whether an unexplained difference may support an equal-pay claim.

Can employers use pay secrecy clauses?
Employers cannot use contractual terms to stop workers disclosing their own pay for the purpose of enforcing equal-pay rights.

However, information obtained through a formal request about other workers may be restricted to use in exercising the right to equal pay. Transparency therefore does not remove confidentiality entirely.

How are workers protected when exercising their rights?
Workers and their representatives must be protected from dismissal, adverse treatment or retaliation when they request information, raise concerns, support another worker or participate in administrative or court proceedings.

These protections are essential because formal rights are of limited value if workers are afraid to use them.

How does the burden of proof work?
Where a worker establishes facts suggesting pay discrimination, the employer must prove that no discrimination occurred.

An employer that has failed to comply with key transparency obligations may also carry the burden of proof unless it demonstrates that the failure was manifestly unintentional and minor.

This reduces the evidential burden on workers who may not have access to the employer’s internal pay information.

What remedies are available?
Successful claims can result in full compensation or reparation. This can include back pay, bonuses, payments in kind, lost opportunities, interest and compensation for distress or other non-material harm.

There is no predetermined upper limit on compensation.

Member States must also provide effective, proportionate and dissuasive penalties. Depending on national law, these may include fines linked to turnover or payroll, loss of public benefits or support, and consequences for public procurement. Repeated breaches must be subject to penalties reflecting the seriousness of the repeated non-compliance.

Can employers be required to change their systems?
Yes. Courts and authorities may require employers to review pay-setting mechanisms, introduce gender-neutral job evaluation, create action plans, raise awareness or provide equal-pay training.

The PTD is intended to correct the systems that enabled the inequality, rather than only compensate workers afterwards.

How long do workers have to bring a claim?
Workers must have a limitation period of at least three years. The period cannot begin before they knew, or could reasonably have known, about the infringement.

A complaint or the start of proceedings must suspend or interrupt the limitation period. Courts must also be able to consider whether an unsuccessful claimant had reasonable grounds for bringing the case when deciding litigation costs.

How is implementation monitored?
Member States must appoint monitoring bodies to gather employer data, analyse pay inequality, assess the impact of the PTD and support reporting to the European Commission.

National gender pay-gap statistics begin flowing annually to Eurostat from 31 January 2028, initially using 2026 as the reference year. Wider PTD monitoring information must be provided to the Commission by 7 June 2028 and every two years thereafter.