The Pay Transparency Directive is causing increasing concern among both employees and employers. There are high hopes for this regulation, but the new provisions also raise numerous questions and doubts. In our study, we present the key changes, new obligations imposed on employers, and information on the next stages of implementation of the Pay Transparency Directive.

The Pay Transparency Directive (EU) 2023/970 aims to strengthen the principle of equal pay between women and men. It imposes a number of obligations on employers, both in terms of job advertisements and employee access to information on remuneration.

The amendment to the Labor Code resulting from the obligation to implement the directive will enter into force six months after its publication, i.e. on December 24, 2025. At this stage, the legislator has not yet introduced all the mechanisms resulting from the directive into the Polish legal system – Poland has until June 2026 to do so.

Notwithstanding the above, despite the six-month waiting period for the amendment to the Labor Code to enter into force and the time for implementation of the remaining provisions of Directive 2023/970, employers should already start preparing for the implementation of the new obligations.

Who will be covered by the new provisions?

The amendment applies to both public and private sector employers, regardless of the number of employees or the size of the company.

The provisions will cover all employees hired under an employment contract. As a rule, the new regulation will not apply to persons employed under civil law contracts (e.g., contract of mandate, contract for specific work). However, it should be noted that the Court of Justice of the European Union has emphasized in its case law that the classification of a person as a “service provider” under national law does not preclude that person from being considered an “employee” within the meaning of EU law if that person’s independence is fictitious and serves only to conceal the true employment relationship. The Polish Supreme Court has expressed a similar opinion on this issue in numerous rulings concerning the fictitious nature of civil law relationships.

What does this mean for entrepreneurs?

The amendment resulting from the need to implement the EU directive aims to eliminate gender-based pay discrimination. To achieve this, the above-mentioned legal acts introduce a number of solutions to increase the transparency of remuneration rules and enable their effective enforcement.

The amendments to the Labor Code currently focus exclusively on the recruitment stage—under the new regulation, job applicants will have the right to receive information from their future employer about the initial salary or salary range and, where applicable, information about the relevant provisions of the employer’s remuneration regulations or collective agreement applicable to the position in question.

Such information must be provided in a manner that allows for informed and transparent negotiations on remuneration – in the job advertisement, before the interview (if there is no recruitment for the position or if the above information is not provided in the job advertisement) or before the employment relationship is established (if there was no recruitment and if no details were provided in the job advertisement or before the interview). However, the employer may not require an applicant to provide information during the recruitment process on the amount of remuneration in their current employment relationship (if any) or in previous employment relationships.

This means that such criteria, whether in the form of remuneration policies, provisions of remuneration regulations or collective agreements, must be developed by employers in relation to the employment structure in a given workplace.

New information obligations for employers regarding remuneration – in perspective

Ultimately, the directive will impose further obligations on employers to ensure that employees have access to information on the remuneration system.

In order to enable employees to enforce their right to equal remuneration, employers will be required, among other things, to:

• provide employees with easy access to the criteria used to determine the remuneration of employees, its levels and the rules for pay increases,
• providing employees with written information on their individual pay levels and average pay levels broken down by gender for categories of employees performing the same work as the employee or work of equal value to their work,
• mandatory regular reporting of data on gender pay gaps – Employers with at least 250 employees will be required to provide detailed information on the pay gap annually, including both average and median differences in basic pay and variable components; smaller companies with 100 to 249 employees will submit such reports every three years.

The directive also prohibits employers from preventing employees from disclosing information about their pay – this means that any new confidentiality agreements, as well as existing ones, cannot include clauses obliging employees to keep their pay confidential.

What next?

The new regulations on pay transparency and equality are a significant challenge for employers, both in terms of legal compliance and HR management practices. Although the deadline for implementing the remaining EU regulations is not until June 2026, it is worth starting to prepare the relevant processes and documentation now.

If you need support in implementing the requirements of the directive or want to make sure that your organization is ready for the changes, please contact our team. We provide assistance in identifying risks and preparing and implementing appropriate procedures and documents in accordance with the new regulations.

Author: Martyna Kulikowska, legal advisor