Creating a fairer Britain
If the scheme was either developed in-house or modified from the framework provided by an external supplier you should be able to use the questions in checklist B to test whether the scheme is non-discriminatory.
If it was bought 'off the shelf' you will need to assure yourself that the supplier has reviewed the principles and practices of their scheme in accordance with the same guidance.
You will also need to check out the way in which you are implementing the scheme.
The older a scheme is, the more likely it is to have been developed without reference to the need to avoid gender or other prohibited forms of bias. If your answers to the questions given in this checklist suggest that your scheme might not stand up to scrutiny, then you will need to decide whether a major overhaul will put things right, or whether it would be better to introduce a new scheme.
Job evaluation schemes should be periodically reviewed to ensure that they remain free from sex or other prohibited forms of bias, in both design and implementation.
Excluding groups of jobs from a job evaluation scheme may perpetuate sex bias, especially if the groups excluded are composed predominantly of employees of one sex (for example, predominantly female cleaners; predominantly male senior managers).
Discrimination in the grading and pay of the jobs of female employees often occurs, or is perpetuated, by their separation into a different grading structure based on a different job evaluation scheme, or no job evaluation scheme at all. You should only exclude groups of employees from a scheme if you have justifiable and non-discriminatory reasons for doing so.
Employers and trade unions should appreciate that problems can be created if bargaining units are used as the sole basis for the scope of jobs to be covered, since this can often be discriminatory. Claims for equal pay for work of equal value can be brought where separate schemes or collective bargaining arrangements are used to justify differences in pay between the sexes, or where members of one sex are left out of a job evaluation scheme.
Incorporating female jobs within the same non-discriminatory job evaluation scheme as the male jobs will help you to achieve equal pay for equal work.
If your pay system, or any part of it, is characterised by a lack of transparency, then the burden of proof is on you as the employer to show that the pay practice is not discriminatory. For more information see the Code of Practice on Equal Pay.
In respect of job evaluation, 'transparent' means that information about the design and implementation of the scheme should be available to employees in a readily understandable form.
Increasingly, the process of job evaluation is being computerised so that, for example, information on jobs is inputted onto computers in the form of answers to pre-formulated questions and a score for the job is then determined within the software programme. Schemes that are computerised are often quicker to implement and they are not inherently discriminatory.
However, any computerised system will reflect the nature of the information it analyses. Therefore, it is important to ensure that your computerised scheme gathers comprehensive information about jobs and is based on factors that are non-discriminatory.
At the benchmarking stage, you should evaluate the benchmark jobs using both the computerised format and written job descriptions or completed job questionnaires. A comparison of the two exercises should then be undertaken to check for sex bias and other prohibited forms of bias.