Pay transparency: what changes when you publish a job advert in Spain
Corpshore Spain editorial team · · 6 min read
In summary: Directive (EU) 2023/970 on pay transparency had a transposition deadline of 7 June 2026, which has passed without Spain approving the implementing legislation. The directive gives candidates the right to know the initial pay or pay band and prohibits asking about pay history.
If you hire in Spain, or are designing an operation that will, there is a European rule on the immediate horizon whose deadline has already passed and whose transposition is still pending. That combination creates a good deal of practical uncertainty.
This article explains what the directive requires, where it stands in Spain, and what is worth doing in the meantime.
Where does the rule stand in Spain?
Directive (EU) 2023/970, on strengthening the application of equal pay between men and women, set a transposition deadline of 7 June 2026.
That deadline has passed and the Spanish legislation that must incorporate all its obligations has not been approved. Spain has missed the deadline set by the European Commission.
A pending transposition does not make the directive irrelevant. It sets the direction clearly, and a company designing its hiring policy today with that in view avoids rebuilding it in a few months.
What does the directive give candidates?
The right to know, in relation to job adverts, the initial pay or the pay band for the role, set on objective and neutral criteria.
And a prohibition that changes interview dynamics considerably: candidates cannot be asked about their pay history. The reasoning is direct, because asking about previous salary carries accumulated inequality from the old role into the new one.
For anyone publishing adverts, the practical consequence is that the band stops being information held back until the end of the process and becomes information the candidate has a right to know earlier.
What else does the directive introduce?
Periodic reporting obligations on the pay gap, an obligation to act on significant unjustified pay differences, and strengthened remedies and sanctions.
Taken together, it raises the minimum standard and significantly increases information obligations towards employees and candidates. It is a change of regime rather than an adjustment.
What is worth doing while transposition is pending?
Publish the pay band in adverts, even though Spanish law does not yet require it. It is what the directive will require, it improves the quality of applications, and it avoids processes collapsing in the final conversation over a misaligned expectation.
Review the interview script to remove the question about previous salary, which is easy to drop and hard to defend once the rule is in force.
And define bands on objective and neutral criteria before you need to justify them, because building that structure calmly is different from building it when someone challenges it.
How does this affect an outsourced operation?
If staff are employed by the provider, the obligations sit with the provider as employer. That does not leave you indifferent: the pay policy of whoever runs your service affects turnover, and turnover affects the quality you receive.
If hiring is direct through a third party managing recruitment on your behalf, the obligations sit with you as employer, and whoever publishes the advert in your name should know it.
In both cases it is worth asking your provider what policy they apply. A vague answer about pay bands usually anticipates a vague answer about turnover.
This article is general information, not legal advice. We work alongside your legal advisors, not in their place.