Gender pay gap reporting in UCD

The Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021 came into effect in July 2021. The key requirements of the legislation are:

• Provision of data
• Reasons for any gaps identified in pay between men and women
• Actions that will be taken by organisations to address the gaps

It is important to note that a gender pay gap is not necessarily an indication of pay discrimination but could relate to the unequal representation of women across the organisation. Regulations were published in mid-May 2022 to provide information in relation to the calculations and further requirements of the legislation.

The Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021 envisages the publication of data and plans are in place to develop an online reporting system for the 2023 reporting cycle. It is anticipated that the system will allow members of the public to search for and view individual employers’ returns, as well as returns for employers in given sectors and regions. Employees can bring claims against their employers to the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) in respect of non-compliance with the Act. While the Act does not provide for sanctions in the form of compensation for the employee or for a fine to be imposed on the employer, the Director General of the Workplace Relations Commission can make an order requiring the employer to take a specified course of action to comply with the Act. All decisions will be published and will include the names of the employer and employee.

Detailed Requirements

The information that employers will be required to publish includes:

• the mean and median gap in hourly pay between men and women
• the mean and median gap in bonus pay between men and women
• the mean and median gap in hourly pay of part-time male and female employees
• the mean and median gap in hourly pay of temporary male and female workers
• the percentage of men and of women who received bonus pay and benefits-in-kind
• the proportions of male and female employees in the lower, lower middle, upper middle and upper quartile pay bands.

Employers are also required to publish a statement setting out, in the employers’ opinion, the reasons for the gender pay gap in their company and what measures are being taken or proposed to be taken by the employer to eliminate or reduce that pay gap.

Timelines

Employers will be required to produce their gender pay gap information within 6 months of their ‘snapshot date’. The snapshot date must be a date in June. Therefore, an employer who chooses 1 June as their snapshot date has a reporting deadline of 1 December. The deadline for publication of the employer’s gender pay gap information is 6 months after their chosen snapshot date.

For more information please click (opens in a new window)here 

In 2022, UCD prepared for the requirements in the legislation  in the following ways:

• Engaging at a sectoral level through the various groups - IUA HRDs, VPs for EDI group, IUA Data Group, Athena SWAN Practitioner Network – this is essential as there will be nuances in the third level sector that need to be agreed at sectoral level in order to enable comparisons to be made
• A national webinar on the Gender Pay Gap was held in March 2022 in collaboration with the IHREC
• Engaging internally and bringing key stakeholders together – a Gender Pay Gap Working Group was established consisting of representatives from EDI, HRIS and Institutional Research
• A review of methodologies where GPG reports have been published – Ireland and UK – was carried out
• A practice run will be done in advance of June to ensure that the data is accurate and to address any challenges in terms of the data
• The collation of data has commenced in preparation for the legislation – UCD published some data as part of its Athena SWAN application in 2020
• An internal and external communications strategy will be looked at – it important there is context provided in relation to the data and the actions identified to address the gaps as part of Gender Pay Gap Report
• As part of UCD’s Gender Equality Action Plan 2020 – 2024, a range of measures have been taken to address gender equality which will have an impact on the gender pay gap. (See Interim Gender Equality Action plan 2020 – 2024 Report).

On 13 July 2021, the Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021 (the Act) was signed into law.

The regulations will require organisations with over 250 employees to report on their gender pay gap in 2022.

The gender pay gap is a measure of the difference between men’s and women’s average earnings across the University.

The figures to be reported are as follows:

• the mean and median gap in hourly pay between men and women
• the mean and median gap in bonus pay between men and women
• the mean and median gap in hourly pay of part-time male and female employees
• the mean and median gap in hourly pay of temporary male and female workers
• the percentage of men and of women who received bonus pay and benefits-in-kind
• the proportions of male and female employees in the lower, lower middle, upper middle and upper quartile pay bands.

• The "Mean" hourly rate is calculated by adding all of the hourly rates together and dividing by the number of individuals in the data set.
• The median hourly rate is calculated by arranging the hourly rates of all individuals in the data set in numerical order to identify the middle (or median) hourly rate. 50% of individuals will earn more than this hourly rate and 50% will earn less.

The gender pay gap is a measure of the difference between men’s and women’s mean and median earnings across the University and is represented as a percentage.

The data will be published on the University’s EDI website and be publically available. 

An employer must report their gender pay gap information annually. 

An “employee”, for the purposes of these reporting obligations, is defined in section 2 of the Employment Equality Act 1998 and means a person who has entered into or works under (or, where the employment has ceased, entered into or worked under) a contract of employment and, where the context admits, includes a member or former member of a regulatory body.

The type of contract workers are engaged on will determine whether they are ‘employees’ and if you must include them in your organisation’s headcount and gender pay gap calculations. The Workplace Relations Commission’s case law may be consulted for guidance.

Workers who are employees of your organisation on your snapshot date must be included in your headcount, and in your gender pay gap calculations. This includes employees who were new recruits on the snapshot date, and also employees who left the organisation after the snapshot date. While employers are only obliged under the Regulations to provide information in respect of their employees, employers are encouraged to take a broad view in assessing their gender pay gaps. For example, an organisation may decide to include partners in its gender pay gap reporting

A step by step approach for calculation of organisations’ gender pay gap metrics is set out in the “Guidelines for Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021 - Updated Guidance Note for Employers on Reporting in 2022”.

For each person employed on the snapshot date, it is suggested the employer begins by calculating the total ordinary pay and total bonus, identifies benefits-in-kind received and determines the total number of working hours worked for the reporting period for each person employed on the snapshot date. Based on this information, the employee’s hourly remuneration can be calculated. Please refer to the definitions of ordinary pay and of bonus remuneration in Regulation 2 and Regulation 5, and to the calculation of hourly remuneration in Regulation 3.

Ordinary pay includes allowances. Examples of allowances include payments in connection with relocation, and payments relating to the recruitment of an employee. Salary top-ups to staff on statutory leave such as maternity leave and paternity leave, should be included.

Travel and subsistence payments reimbursing employees for expenditure wholly and necessarily incurred by them in the course of their work is not included within the meaning of ordinary pay for the purpose of these Regulations.

Where ordinary pay or bonus remuneration is paid to employees in currencies other than the Euro, for example where employees may be working abroad, the Euro equivalent amount as recorded in the organisation’s accounts should be used for the purpose of gender pay gap reporting. Pay should be calculated before deductions as source. Examples of such deductions at source are taxes and employees’ pension contributions.

Benefit in kind is not included in the calculation of either ordinary pay or bonus remuneration.

Regulation 2 provides that relevant employees for the purposes of gender pay gap reporting are the employees of a relevant employer on the snapshot date, and provides a definition of part-time employee. The full-time or part-time employment status of the employee as of the snapshot date should be noted. The employee’s status on the snapshot date should be used when calculating the gender pay differences relevant to part-time employees, i.e. under Regulations 7.(1)(b) and 8.(1)(b).

Where employees moving between full-time and part-time working is considered by the employer to be relevant to any gender pay differences in the organisation, the employer is encouraged to discuss this in the relevant report.

Regulation 2 provides that relevant employees for the purposes of gender pay gap reporting are the employees of a relevant employer on the snapshot date. The employment status of the employee as of the snapshot date should be noted, as regards whether they are on a temporary contract or a contract of indefinite duration. The employee’s status on the snapshot date should be used when calculating the gender pay differences relevant to employees on temporary contracts, i.e. under Regulations 7.(1)(c) and 8.(1)(c).

Where employees moving between temporary contracts and contracts of indefinite duration is considered by the employer to be relevant to any gender pay differences in the organisation, the employer is encouraged to discuss this in the relevant report.

Only claimants that have claimed for hours worked are included in this report. Any claims for a 'Value' where no hours are entered were not included as an accurate hourly rate could not be calculated. 

UCD has commenced and is carrying out a major review of the hourly paid practices under an Hourly Paid project, examining rates and scales of pay, contractual provisions, processes and supporting guidance associated with the hiring of hourly paid workers.  T

he Gender Pay Gap requirements as regards hourly paid workers will be incorporated into this project to ensure the gendered impacts of hourly paid practices are in scope. This will include ensuring that the hours of all hourly paid individuals are recorded so the full cohort of hourly paid workers can be included in future calculations.

The Regulations do not require organisations to provide any information on job classifications at this time in reporting on their gender pay gaps.

Remuneration other than money is not included within the meaning of ordinary pay for the purpose of gender pay gap reporting. Please refer to Regulation 2 and Regulation 5.

The employer is not required to give a monetary value to benefits in kind. For the purposes of the Regulations, the employer is only required to calculate the proportion of male and of female employees who received benefits in kind.

A person who is a newly-recruited employee of the organisation on the snapshot date will be taken into account in determining its headcount, even where the person has yet to receive pay.

Under Regulation 3, hourly remuneration is only calculated in respect of employees who have received ordinary pay or bonus remuneration during the 12 month period up to and including the snapshot date. Accordingly, a new recruit who has yet to receive pay is not included in the calculation of hourly pay and subsequent gender pay gap calculations.

In determining the number of employees, all employees are counted.

In instances where an employee does not self-identify as either gender, an employer may omit the individual from the gender pay gap calculations.

It is important for employers to be sensitive to how an employee identifies in terms of their gender. The regulations do not define the terms ‘male gender and ‘female gender’ and the requirement to report your gender pay gap should not result in employees being singled out and questioned about their gender

Plans are in place to develop an online reporting system for the 2023 reporting cycle.

It is anticipated that the system will allow members of the public to search for and view individual employers’ returns, as well as returns for employers in given sectors and regions

For the 2022 reporting cycle, the gender pay gap information must be published on UCD's EDI websiteso it is accessible to all its employees and to the public, and for a period of at least three years beginning with the date of publication.

The reporting deadline for the 2022 cycle will fall in December 2022. Plans are in place to develop an online reporting system for the 2023 reporting cycle. It is anticipated that the system will enable members of the public to search for and view individual employers’ returns on the database, both overall and by year, including browsing for returns.