Portugal Gender Pay Gap Reporting: What You Need to Know

To find the full text of the global pay reporting law in Portugal, refer to Portugal’s Equal Pay Law (Law 60/2018). You can also reference CITE’s Guide to Job Evaluation Based on Objective Criteria, Common to Men and Women and Self Assessment Guide on Gender Equality in Companies.

The Single Report (Relatório Único) is how all employers submit data to the government’s Ministry of Labor, Solidarity, and Social Security (MTSS).

This report contains information on the social activity of the company, the firm (location, industry, employment, sales, ownership, and legal setting, among other features), and on each of its workers (gender, age, education, skill, occupational category, tenure, wages, hours worked, and more). The content and deadline for submission is regulated by Ministerial Order no. 55/2010, of 21 January.

The information contained in the report is included in the Quadros de Pessoal, where information about each individual company is available for consultation only by the respective company itself and the labour inspectorate (Autoridade para as Condicoes do Trabalho (ACT), for inspection purposes and preventive activities.

The pay gap requirement in Portugal focuses primarily on gender. The reporting requirements and metrics are designed to assess and address the gender pay gaps within organizations.

While the law doesn’t explicitly require reporting on race/ethnicity pay gaps, many organizations also analyse race and ethnicity gaps as part of their pay transparency strategy, where it is permitted by law.

Syndio’s PayEQ solution allows you to analyse pay equity and opportunity gaps across multiple dimensions, including race, gender, ethnicity, age, disability, and more. This provides a comprehensive understanding of how different groups are affected by your policies and practices.

In the first semester of each year, the Labor Ministry discloses statistics on salary inequalities generally, by sector, by company, by profession, and by employees’ qualification levels. The information is sent to the Authority for Work Conditions (“ACT”), so that problematic cases may be identified and investigated.

Syndio provides software and expert professional services to help companies comply with pay equity, pay reporting, and pay transparency regulations. Syndio helps you analyse, remediate, explain, and report on pay gaps so you can stay on top of compliance in Portugal. Learn more: https://synd.io/global-pay-reporting/.

The law in Portugal analyses pay gaps, not pay equity. What’s the difference?

An unadjusted pay gap (also called an “uncontrolled pay gap”) is the difference between the median or mean pay of two groups, such as men and women.

• Median pay gap: Imagine lining up all the earnings for two groups of employees (e.g., men and women) from lowest to highest. The median pay gap is the difference between the middle earnings in each line. It’s a good indicator of typical pay differences.
• Mean pay gap: This compares the average earnings of each group. However, it can be skewed by extremely high or low earners.

Pay equity, or the adjusted pay gap, accounts for factors that can legitimately explain differences in pay, such as performance ratings, tenure with the company, or location.

The median and mean pay gaps provide valuable insights, but they don’t tell the whole story. There may be legitimate reasons for pay differences between employees. The adjusted pay gap (pay equity) accounts for these factors, revealing whether a pay disparity truly exists (which is unlawful in many countries) so you can take corrective action. Syndio’s PayEQ software is the trusted solution for global enterprises to rapidly identify, address, and prevent pay disparities.