In 2023, the European Union adopted the Pay Transparency Directive (EU 2023/970) with the aim of strengthening pay equity and closing gender pay gaps across member states. This directive reinforces the long-standing principle of “equal pay for equal work or work of equal value” between men and women by introducing clearer transparency obligations and enforcement mechanisms. In practical terms, it seeks to remove hidden gender-based pay discrimination by empowering employees with information about pay. For example, workers will get new rights to access pay information (such as knowing the average pay for peers of another gender in roles of equal value) and employers will be subject to reporting on the organization’s pay gaps. By increasing the level of transparency related to pay, the EU’s goal is to help eliminate unjustified gender pay gaps (currently averaging ~13% in the EU) and promote fair, transparent compensation policies.
All EU countries must transpose the directive’s measures into national law by June 7, 2026. Many provisions are quite significant, so countries are phasing them in. Poland has taken the first implementation step under this directive, by focusing on pay transparency at the recruitment stage, while further measures (like pay reporting) will need to be added later.
1. New Pay Transparency Duties in Poland (Effective Dec 24, 2025)
Poland’s first pay transparency related legislation (Journal of Laws 2025, item 807) will enter into force on December 24, 2025, and will amend the Polish Labour Code to introduce pre-employment pay transparency obligations. Although a smaller part of the overall directive, it is key for HR and reward professionals to prepare for the following key requirements:
- Salary Range Disclosure to Candidates: Employers must inform job candidates about the remuneration for the position they apply for, specifically, the initial salary amount or the salary range for the role. This “remuneration” is defined broadly to include all components of pay (base salary and other benefits or bonuses) that the new hire would receive. The law specifies that any salary range given should be based on objective, gender-neutral criteria, i.e. grounded in fair factors like skills or experience and not differing by the candidate’s gender.
- Time of pay disclosure: According to the new Article 183ca §2, this pay information must be shared with enough advance time to allow the candidate to consider it and negotiate on an informed basis. The Polish law is flexible about when the employer delivers the information, as long as it is before the employment contract is finalized. Acceptable timings include providing the salary/range in the job advertisement, before a job interview, or at latest, immediately before the employment relationship is agreed (if earlier disclosure wasn’t done). In other words, if an employer didn’t post the salary in the job listing, they can still comply by disclosing it to the candidate prior to the interview or by the time of the offer signing. The key is that the candidate receives the pay details in writing (paper or electronic form) sufficiently early for “conscious and transparent negotiations”, thereby not at the very last minute. Employers can use an email or document to fulfill this duty (an oral disclosure during an interview or a phone offer is not enough).
- Disclosure of Pay Structures (Collective Agreements/Regulations): If the company’s pay system is governed by a collective labor agreement or an internal pay regulation, the employer must also inform the candidate of any relevant provisions in those documents that affect pay. For example, if there are rules on bonuses, annual raises, or other compensation elements in a collective agreement or the company’s remuneration policy, the relevant parts should be communicated to the applicant. Employers will likely need to prepare a short summary or excerpt of such provisions for candidates, rather than sending entire policy documents, to ensure that the candidate doesn’t get overwhelmed.
- Gender-Neutral Job Announcements and Titles: The amendment adds Article 183ca §3, requiring that job postings and job titles are gender-neutral, and that recruitment must be done in a non-discriminatory way. In practice, this means job ads should no longer indicate a preference for a particular gender (even implicitly through gendered job titles). Employers should use language that does not favor or exclude any gender. For instance, rather than advertising for a “sekretarka” (a feminine form of secretary in Polish) or “sekretarz” (masculine form), an employer might say “position in office administration” or use both gender forms (e.g. “sekretarz/sekretarka”) to stay neutral. The law does not spell out a specific method, but HR teams should review how roles are titled in job ads and internally. Companies may need to update existing job titles in contracts, internal pay grade tables, and HR systems to ensure they are free of gender markers. The goal is to make sure the hiring process is fair and inclusive, so no one feels discouraged from applying based on their gender. Everyone should be judged by their skills and experience, not by the demographic class they belong to.
- Ban on Salary History Questions: Employers are explicitly banned from asking about a candidate’s past or current pay during the recruitment process. The amendment to Article 22(1) §1 point 6 of the Labour Code states that while an employer may ask about a candidate’s previous employment history, they cannot ask for information about the pay at the candidate’s current or former jobs. This “salary history ban” is meant to prevent prolonging pay differences: an applicant’s prior pay (which may reflect historical gender pay gaps or biases) shouldn’t influence the offer for a new position. Recruiters and hiring managers in Poland will need to remove any salary-related questions from their interview scripts and application forms. Instead, discussions should focus on the salary for the position at hand (as per the new transparency rules) rather than what the candidate earned before.
Each of the above changes will take effect in Poland on December 24, 2025. These measures represent a partial transposition of the EU directive, focused on transparency in hiring. They are designed to level the playing field at the job application stage, so that all candidates know the salary on offer and none are disadvantaged by opacity or biased job criteria from the beginning.
2. What’s Missing or Unclear?
While this new law is a significant move toward pay transparency, it does not cover all aspects of the EU directive. There are a few gaps and ambiguities to be aware of in this first implementation stage:
- No Requirement to Publish Salary in the Job Ad: Notably, Poland stopped short of mandating that every job posting include a salary range. The law only ensures candidates get the information by the time a job offer is made, but allows employers to choose when to reveal the salary (anytime during recruitment as long as it’s before employment starts). This means an employer could choose to disclose pay at the last step (offer stage) rather than upfront in the advertisement. Such flexibility creates ambiguity and may lead to uneven implementation. We are sure to see some organizations embracing full transparency in job ads, while others might continue their current practice of discussing pay only at the end of the hiring process - essentially the same as the previous status quo. In short, salary transparency in Poland’s job market might improve, but it is not guaranteed to be universal from day one, since the timing is left to employer discretion as long as minimum compliance is met.
- “Gender-Neutral” Job Titles – Undefined Scope: The new requirement for gender-neutral wording in job titles and postings raises practical questions. The law itself provides no definition or specific guidelines on what counts as a gender-neutral job title. This is challenging in a language like Polish, where many job titles have masculine and feminine forms. Should employers use only generic masculine forms (traditionally sometimes viewed as universal), or explicitly include both gender forms for each title, or rephrase titles in a gender-agnostic way? The legislation doesn’t say, leaving it to employers (and, potentially, future case law) to interpret. We do know that job ads cannot indicate a preferred gender of candidate – for example, listing a role as “kierowca” (masc. driver) or “kierowczyni” (fem. driver) exclusively would not be neutral. Best practice emerging in Poland is to either use an epicene term (if one exists) or list both masculine and feminine versions of the title. Many organizations have already started using such double forms (e.g. “Specjalista/Specjalistka ds. HR” for HR Specialist). There’s also the issue of existing employment documents: companies may need to review and update internal job titles in contracts, pay scales, and HR records to ensure they comply. However, the law doesn’t explicitly address whether previously issued job titles must be retroactively changed or just that new references should be neutral. In sum, employers are expected to make a good-faith effort to use inclusive language, but the exact approach is not legislated.
- No Employee “Right to Information” or Pay Gap Reporting (Yet): The current Polish amendment covers only recruitment transparency, leaving out the directive’s later-stage requirements. At this stage we are not seeing any provisions granting employees the right to request pay information about colleagues (to check for potential gender pay gaps), as well as the obligation for larger employers to report gender pay gap statistics. These elements of the EU directive, such as regular reporting on the company’s gender pay gap and pay quartile distribution, have “not yet been addressed” in Polish law. Poland’s government has indicated that this is just the first step, with work underway on a separate, more comprehensive bill to fulfill the remaining directive obligations by the 2026 deadline. Employers should anticipate that requirements like employee pay report requests, transparency of pay structures internally, and formal pay gap reporting will likely become law in the next phase of implementation.
3. Practical Implications for Employers
For HR and reward professionals in Poland, these new rules mean it’s time to update policies and practices well before the December 2025 effective date. Here’s what to consider doing now:
- Review and Revise Recruitment Materials: Companies should revisit their job advertisement templates and recruitment workflows to ensure compliance. This includes adding a salary figure or range (and possibly benefit information) into the hiring process at the appropriate stage. Even though the law doesn’t force you to put pay in the published ad, providing it as early as possible can improve candidate trust and avoid wasting time. Consider including at least a salary range in job postings or, at minimum, prepare a standard written communication (email or document) to send to all candidates before interviews, disclosing the pay details. Also double-check that all job descriptions and titles in postings are written in gender-neutral language, you may need to adjust wording or list both gender forms for certain roles.
- Train Recruitment Staff: It is crucial to inform everyone involved in hiring, recruiters, HR staff, and hiring managers, about these new obligations. Update your interview guidelines and application forms to remove any questions about a candidate’s current or past salary (asking such information will be illegal). Instead, train staff to proactively share the salary info for the open position with candidates at the set point in your process. Recruiters should also be aware of using inclusive language and avoiding any discriminatory phrasing or criteria during interviews.
- Monitor and Prepare for Future Requirements: The December 2025 changes are just the beginning. It is important to keep an eye on legislative developments as Poland works on the next phase of the Pay Transparency Directive implementation (Tip: sign up to our newsletter in the bottom and we will keep you updated**)**. It’s expected that additional obligations, such as enabling employees to request pay comparisons and gender pay gap reporting for larger firms will be introduced in the near future. As such, it is vital that companies start preparing for the directive immediately, as the process towards compliance is longer than most anticipate. It all starts by establishing ‘work of equal value’, after which a thorough analysis that statistically asseses the organizationgs gaps must be conducted. What many companies overlook is, that the next salary review will be the last prior to the pay transparency implementation date, and therefore they potential budgets needed for corrections must be a part of the next budget cycle. By taking these proactive steps, employers will not only comply with the incoming rules but can also position themselves as fair and transparent workplaces, which is increasingly important for employer brand and talent attraction.
In summary, Poland’s first step toward pay transparency brings new duties in hiring that HR and rewards teams must act on soon. The changes aim to make salary offers more transparent and equitable from the outset of employment. While some ambiguities remain, this initial implementation is a signal to employers to start the preperation.
Feel free to reach out if you would like a sparring session on how to get started with your pay transparency project, or to learn how we can help with identifying, closing, and explaining gaps in the organization, while taking care of global reporting requirements.
Photo Credits: Marek Borawski / KPRP - President Andrzej Duda at the World Economic Forum in Davos
