Quick Hits
- B.C. employers that had fifty or more employees on January 1, 2026, must publish their first pay transparency report by November 1, 2026.
- Reports must disclose gender-based gaps in hourly pay, overtime, and bonuses, as well as the gender makeup of pay quartiles.
- Reporting is an annual obligation.
Which Employers Must Report
Unless exempted by regulation, an employer becomes a “reporting employer” based on its headcount on January 1 of the applicable year, under a phased schedule:
- 2024: 1,000 or more employees
- 2025: 300 or more employees
- 2026: 50 or more employees
Reporting is an annual obligation. After 2026, the threshold remains employers with at least fifty employees, unless a lower number is set by regulation.
Step 1: Collecting Gender Information
For the first reporting year, employers must make reasonable efforts to collect each employee’s self-identified gender category. Going forward, employers must also request this information from new hires when they start and give all employees an opportunity at least once a year to provide or update the information. Employers must inform employees that providing this information is voluntary.
The Pay Transparency Regulation sets three gender categories: “Man,” “Woman,” and “Non-binary.” Any employee choosing not to provide gender information should be marked as “unknown.” “Unknown” covers employees who do not identify with the categories, who prefer not to disclose, or for whom the employer has no information.
Step 2: Selecting the Reporting Period
Employers may choose the twelve-month period the report covers: either the most recently completed financial year, or the calendar year preceding the report year.
Step 3: Preparing the Report
The report must include basic employer information: the employer’s name, mailing address, and NAICS code; the start dates and end dates of the reporting period; and the employee count as of January 1.
The report must show:
- mean and median differences in hourly rate of pay
- mean and median differences in overtime pay and overtime hours
- mean and median differences in bonus pay
- the percentage of each gender category that received overtime pay and bonus pay
- the gender makeup of each of the four pay quartiles, with employees ranked from lowest to highest hourly rate
The hourly rate is the total ordinary pay divided by the hours for which ordinary pay was received. Bonus pay includes commissions, bonuses paid in securities, holiday and year-end bonuses, and profit-sharing.
The government provides an online Pay Transparency Reporting Tool that enables employers to easily create pay transparency reports as required under the Pay Transparency Act and the Pay Transparency Regulation. The tool provides a sample spreadsheet to input employee information and generates a draft report with the necessary calculations to report on pay gaps.
Privacy protections. To preserve privacy, pay data should be suppressed if there are fewer than ten individuals in a gender category.
Step 4: Publishing the Report
Once the report is complete, employers must post it on a publicly accessible website as soon as practicable. Employers without a website must post a copy in a conspicuous place in each workplace and provide a copy to any member of the public on request. The report must remain available until the next report is published.
Obligations Applicable to All Employers
Several provisions of the Pay Transparency Act already apply to every B.C. employer, regardless of size:
- Pay in job postings: Publicly advertised jobs must state the expected wage or salary, or a wage or salary range (in effect since November 1, 2023).
- No pay history questions: Employers may not ask applicants about their pay history, directly or through a third party, unless the information is publicly available.
- No reprisals: Employers may not discipline or otherwise disadvantage employees for asking about their pay, sharing their pay with coworkers or applicants, asking about the pay transparency report, or reporting noncompliance to the director of pay transparency.
Next Steps for Employers
With the deadline fast approaching, employers with fifty or more employees may wish to consider the following steps:
- Confirming their January 1, 2026, headcount to determine whether they are reporting employers.
- Collecting employee gender information promptly, if they have not already done so, and making clear that disclosure is voluntary.
- Confirming that payroll systems can separate ordinary pay, overtime pay, and bonus pay.
- Reviewing any pay gaps before publication and preparing consistent messaging for employee inquiries.
Ogletree Deakins’ Canadian offices, Cross-Border Practice Group, Government Contracting and Compliance Practice Group, Pay Equity Practice Group, and Workforce Analytics and Compliance Practice Group will continue to monitor developments and will provide updates on the firm’s Cross-Border, Government Contracting and Compliance, Pay Equity, and Workforce Analytics and Compliance blogs as additional information becomes available.
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