The Equality Act

The Equality Act, which will become law in October 2010, will place a number of new responsibilities on employers to ensure fair treatment particularly in the area of pay. To make sure your arrangements will meet the new requirements, we have listed below a simple check list of the sorts of things you should be thinking about:

• Implement or review your job evaluation schemes. These will provide a framework for planning, monitoring and justifying pay differentials, and they will be conclusive evidence in any equal pay challenge.
• Approach each term in the contract of employment separately. For instance, do not try to compensate a woman who receives lower pay than a man with some other kind of benefit, or vice versa.
• When devising criteria on which levels of pay are based, avoid things that are harder for members of one sex to do than members of the other. If such criteria are included in a pay structure, they must be relevant to the job in question.
• Publish your pay policy and be transparent about the way pay rates are determined.
• Be careful to check the implications of protecting a redeployed employee's salary

Equal Pay Audits

A good way of checking compliance would be to conduct an Equal Pay Audit. These do not have to be daunting. Instead, they can be a practical exercise that benefits both the employer and employees. However, they are not likely to rank high on the list of priorities for a busy HR team unless pressed into action by a union or legal action.

Research published by the CIPD in February 2009 found that only 54% of employers have conducted, or are intending to conduct, an equal pay audit, with the majority of these in the public sector. The report points to the business benefits of conducting equal pay audits, such as employees who feel disadvantaged in pay due to their sex, ethnicity or disability being less likely to be engaged and motivated to help the business succeed. Employees who are confident that there is equality of pay are more likely to be powerful advocates and motivated contributors in the future success of their companies.

CELRE can provide the resources and simplify the audit process. We will review your procedures, work with you to gather any data that is required, conduct the analysis and compile the results. We will identify any “at risk” areas and help you construct an action plan, to ensuring you minimise any current exposure, and mitigate any risk from future legislation.