Pay Transparency Directive Compliance in Croatia

The EU Pay Transparency Directive (Directive 2023/970) requires employers to report pay gaps and allow employees to request pay equity information. Key obligations from June 2026: salary ranges must be published in job postings for companies with more than 150 employees; employees can request pay data for comparable roles; pay gap reporting every 3 years for companies with 150–249 employees, annually for 250+; pay audits are triggered when a reported gap exceeds 5%. The June 7, 2026 transposition deadline applies to member states, with employer obligations starting from that date.

Yes — the EU Pay Transparency Directive (Article 5) requires employers to provide information about the initial pay or pay range to job applicants before the interview, either in the job vacancy notice or proactively otherwise. The information must be provided without the candidate having to request it. Employers are also prohibited from asking candidates about their pay history. These obligations apply to all employers following member state transposition — the transposition deadline is 7 June 2026. The salary range must reflect the actual pay bracket for the role and cannot be so wide as to be meaningless. Germany, France, and Austria are among the first member states to begin transposition.

Pay gap reporting under the EU Pay Transparency Directive is phased by company size: employers with 250 or more employees must report annually from 2027 (for FY2026 data); employers with 150–249 employees must report every three years starting from 2027; employers with 100–149 employees must report every three years starting from 2031. If a reported gender pay gap exceeds 5% and the employer cannot justify it on objective, gender-neutral criteria, a joint pay assessment with employee representatives is mandatory. Employers with fewer than 100 employees have no mandatory pay gap reporting obligation but must provide pay information to individual employees on request.

The EU Pay Transparency Directive (Article 7) grants employees the right to request information about their individual pay level and average pay levels for workers performing the same work or work of equal value, broken down by sex. Employers must respond in writing within two months. Employers may not prevent workers from disclosing their pay to colleagues or retaliate against anyone exercising pay transparency rights — dismissal, demotion, or negative performance assessment triggered by pay transparency requests are prohibited. Workers also have the right to be accompanied by an employee representative when requesting pay information. These rights apply regardless of employer size.