Gender pay gap reporting: We’re here to help

Learn how Mercer can help you successfully report and publish your gender pay gap results to comply with new government legislation.
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What is gender pay gap reporting? 

Under Gender Pay Gap reporting rules in Ireland, employers must annually report up to 20 metrics relating to differences in pay between men and women. The reporting requirement applies to all organisations with more than 150 employees in 2024, and all organisations with more than 50 employees from 2025.

Which organisations need to report their gender pay gap

2022

From 2022 employers in Ireland with 250 or more employees need to report

2024

From 2024 the requirements will apply to employers with 150 or more employees

2025

From 2025 it will apply to those with 50 or more employees

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Mercer can help you with gender pay gap reporting

Mercer provides a range of services to help employers to report, understand, communicate and address their gender pay gaps.

Mercer’s four step approach to mandatory gender pay pap reporting

  • 1. Kick off data request

    Mercer will arrange a kick-off meeting to discuss and explain the planned approach. We will then share a simple data template for you to complete and return to us via our secure data exchange platform.

  • 2. Review and data validation

    Once the data is received, Mercer will review and validate with you via a video conference or through email exchange with questions/answers.

  • 3. First draft of results

    Mercer will run the calculations and produce the first set of results. The results will be shared and discussed during a video conference.

  • 4. Final report

    An eventual adjustment will be made and the results report will be finalized.

What is required when publishing your gender pay gap results?

  •  The difference between hourly remuneration of male employees and female employees (mean and median).
  •  The differences between bonus remuneration of male employees and female employees (mean and median).
  • The differences between the median hourly remuneration of male part-time employees and female part-time employees.
  • The percentage of all male employees and all female employees who were paid bonus remuneration.
  • The percentage of all male employees and all female employees who received benefits in kind.
  • The differences between hourly remuneration of male employees on temporary contracts and female employees  on such contracts (mean and median).
  • The proportions of male and female employees in the lower, lower middle, upper middle and upper quartile pay bands.

 
  • Employers must publish a narrative including:
    o   The reasons for the differences
    o   Measures being taken (or planned to take) to eliminate
         or reduce differences
  • The gender pay gap information must be published on the employer’s website or in some other way that is accessible to all its employees and to the public for three years.
  • The government ultimately envisages making a portal available for publication.

  • The Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission (IHREC) can apply for Circuit Court orders requiring a person to comply with the legislation.
  • An employee can make a complaint to the Workplace Relations Commission but no compensation or sanctions are defined in the regulations.

Managing the gender pay gap narrative

Your gender pay gap report is likely to be of interest to your key stakeholders including employees, clients, shareholders and the media.

To manage the narrative you will need to understand and explain the factors driving any identified pay gap and set out plans for any remedial actions needed. Mercer can support you to to look behind the headline numbers and understand the root causes through:

An Internal Labour Market map is a simple, yet powerful, “system-at-a-glance” descriptive summary of key aspects of an organization’s workforce dynamics. It highlights areas of risk and the need for further examination. Representation and differences in roles is a key driver of pay gaps. 

Internal Labour Market maps can be created for an entire organization or for a specific segment and can be used to depict the flows of different groups (Gender, Age, etc.) throughout an organization. The future direction of your gender pay gap will be influenced by hiring, promotion and departure patterns, which the Internal Labour Map will display and project.

 

The gender pay gap does not measure whether pay is equitable once job roles and levels are taken into account. Equal Pay Analysis can help to illustrate, regardless of the existence of a Gender Pay Gap, whether an employer is treating people equitably within given roles. The analysis includes an overview of corrective measures identified, and job level specific outliers, with recommendations for remediation actions. Examination of pay discrepancies within roles and levels will become legally required once the EU Pay Transparency Directive comes into force.

Pay Equity Regression Analysis determines how much of a gender pay gap is explicable by means of legitimate factors – for example, differences in experience, performance or seniority. By adjusting for these factors we are able to establish how much of a gender pay gap remains unexplained – and therefore potentially problematic with regard to equal pay principles.

Mercer will organise a workshop to establish the themes that your organisation wishes to emphasise as part of the Gender Pay Gap narrative. On gathering information about your aims, programmes and work practices, we will create a draft narrative, which will then be refined in consultation with you prior to publication. We aim to produce a narrative that sets out to your people and your wider stakeholders the reasons for your gender pay gap, the mitigating steps that you plan and your wider DEI vision and strategy.

You may wish for access to self-service technology to assist you in analysing pay equity within your organisation. With our partner Pay Analytics, we can provide solutions that enable you both to uncover any issues relating to pay equity within your organisation, along with suggestions as to priority areas for redress and the cost of corrective action. We can also provide support consulting if required to help you with using the technology and interpreting its output.

        What you don’t measure, you can’t manage. Gender pay gap reporting gives employers valuable insights into their internal pay and talent dynamics. The logical next steps concern root cause analysis and remedial action.
        Danny Mansergh

        Head of Career Consulting at Mercer Ireland

        We’re here to help you meet your gender pay gap reporting obligations!

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          Contact us about your gender pay gap reporting today!

          We will help you to conduct your GPG activities carefully and correctly within the government guidelines and timeline.