EU Pay Transparency Directive: Updates on Implementation Across Member States

Quick Hits

• Under the EU pay transparency directive (Directive (EU) 2023/970), employers are subject to requirements, such as upholding the principle of “work of equal value,” reporting on gender pay gap statistics, and making pay information available to job applicants during recruitment and employees upon request.
• Each EU member state can choose to implement compliance requirements beyond the directive’s existing requirements.
• Belgium, Sweden, Poland, Ireland, the Netherlands, and Finland have so far led the way, and other EU countries are expected to publish draft proposals during 2025.

As detailed in our previous article, “Preparing for the EU’s Pay Transparency Directive,” the directive calls for a review of current employer practices to ensure ongoing compliance.

Key Updates From Member States

Belgium

Belgium became the first EU member state to transpose the directive into national law. The Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles, which is mainly applicable to public sector employers in the French Community of Belgium, was signed into law on 12 September 2024 and has been effective since 1 January 2025. The decree does not apply universally to all Belgian employers, and the directive will continue to be transposed across Belgium, although the timeframe for implementation is still unknown.

Key provisions go beyond the directive’s minimum requirements:

• Pay information or salary ranges at the recruitment stage must be presented in a format that is accessible for individuals with disabilities.
• Job titles used in recruitment must be nondiscriminatory.
• Gender pay gap reporting must include a fair assessment of pay progression for employees who take family-related leave.

Sweden

The Swedish government shared an investigation for the transposition of the directive on 29 May 2024, which is currently under review. The directive introduces stricter pay transparency and gender pay gap reporting requirements for employers than the existing Swedish Discrimination Act, including:

• Providing pay information to job applicants. Employers would be required to disclose the relevant provisions of their collective agreements as well as the salary range to candidates before interviews.
• Ensuring pay information, such as salary and pay progression, is easily accessible. Employees would also be entitled to request pay information through employee representatives or gender equality bodies rather than directly from the employer. Under Swedish law, all companies with twenty-five or more employees in Sweden have employee representatives on their board of directors, which would enable this provision to operate effectively.
• Including specific content requirements for gender pay reports. This includes how pay has been determined; this requirement has already been implied in the directive, but the Swedish proposal specifically addresses this requirement.
• Gender pay gap reporting would have to include a comparison of pay progression for employees who take parental leave compared with employees who do work of equal value but do not take parental leave.
• Sweden would maintain current pay reporting requirements under the Swedish Discrimination Act for employers with ten or more employees.

Poland

Poland’s progress on transposing the directive is at the draft legislation stage. Originally initiated by members of Parliament on 5 December 2024, a new version of the draft was presented by a parliamentary committee on 1 April 2025. On 9 May 2025, the Polish parliament (Sejm) passed a draft amending the Labour Code. The draft largely aligns with the directive but currently does not state provisions for gender pay gap reporting obligations and is limited to the recruitment stage. The draft will now progress to the Senate for further review, and, after the legislative process is completed, the act will take effect within six months from the date of promulgation.

In its current form, the draft includes the following obligations:

• Providing applicants with information on the starting salary or its range (based on objective and neutral criteria) and, where applicable, the relevant provisions of collective agreements or remuneration regulations throughout the recruitment process, including in the job advertisement.
• Using gender-neutral language in job advertisements and gender-neutral job titles, as well as conducting the recruitment processes in a non-discriminatory manner.
• A prohibition on asking questions regarding salary history.

Ireland

Ireland published the General Scheme of the Equality (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2024 on 15 January 2025. Like Poland, Ireland did not include any details that address the pay reporting requirement under the directive. However, unlike Poland, Ireland already has gender pay reporting in place under the Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021, which requires employers with a headcount of 150 or more employees (reducing to 50 or more employees from 1 June 2025) to publish information on their gender pay gap annually.

The current draft specifies:

• Job advertisements must include the pay rate or range for the job role. This is more stringent than the directive, which allows employer flexibility in providing the information to the applicant in advance of the interview rather than requiring its inclusion in the job posting.
• Employers are prohibited from requesting information from job applicants regarding their pay history.

The Netherlands

In March 2025, the Netherlands published its draft proposal, which closely follows the text of the directive. This draft was subject to public consultation; the outcome of which is currently undergoing further review in the Dutch Parliament.

Finland

On 16 May 2025, the Finnish government published its draft proposal, which largely aligns with the directive by specifying the inclusion of pay rates during the recruitment stage, the right of employees to request pay information, and the prohibition on employers from requesting information from job applicants regarding their pay history.

However, the draft goes beyond Finland’s current pay survey reporting obligations and does contain specific nuances on reporting by company size. Under the proposal, gender pay gap reporting would be required for companies with 100 or more employees. This would follow a phased approach with companies with 150 to 249 employees reporting by 2027, and those with 100 to 149 employees by 2031. Fines for noncompliance are proposed to range from €5,000 to €80,000.

Organisations can stay up to date with the progress of Directive (EU) 2023/970 and how it will apply across each EU member state by visiting Ogletree Deakins’ interactive EU Pay Transparency Directive – Member State Implementation Tracker.

Ogletree Deakins’ London office and in-house data analytics team will continue to monitor developments and will provide updates on the Cross-Border, Leaves of Absence, and Pay Equity blogs as additional information becomes available.

Daniella McGuigan is a partner in the London office of Ogletree Deakins and co-chair of the firm’s Pay Equity Practice Group.

Lorraine Matthews, a data privacy and cybersecurity practice assistant in the London office of Ogletree Deakins, contributed to this article.

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