British Columbia enacted the Pay Transparency Act (SBC 2023 Chapter 18), which came into force November 1, 2023. BC was one of the first Canadian provinces to require salary ranges in all public job postings, making it a model for other provinces now following suit. BC's law also imposes phased pay transparency reporting requirements on employers of different sizes.
Who does the BC Pay Transparency Act apply to?
The posting requirements apply to all employers in British Columbia that post publicly accessible job advertisements — there is no minimum employee threshold for the posting obligation.
Job posting requirements (effective Nov 1, 2023)
- All publicly posted job opportunities must include the expected pay or pay range for the position
- The pay range should reflect what the employer genuinely expects to pay — a good faith estimate is required
- Applies to roles physically performed in BC and remote roles where BC-based candidates would apply
Pay transparency reporting (phased rollout)
In addition to posting requirements, BC employers must publish annual pay transparency reports comparing pay across gender groups. The phase-in schedule:
| Employer size | First report due |
|---|---|
| BC public sector / Crown corporations | November 1, 2023 |
| 1,000+ employees | November 1, 2024 |
| 300–999 employees | November 1, 2025 |
| 50–299 employees | November 1, 2026 |
Reports must be posted publicly on your organization's website and submitted to the BC government. They must include mean and median pay gaps between gender groups across your workforce.
Salary history prohibition
The BC Pay Transparency Act also prohibits employers from asking applicants about their pay history and from using pay history to set compensation. This applies to all employers in BC.
Employer checklist
- ✓ Include expected pay or pay range in all BC job postings
- ✓ Remove salary history questions from applications and interviews
- ✓ Know your reporting threshold and first report due date
- ✓ Publish pay transparency report on your website when required
- ✓ Apply to remote roles where BC residents could apply
How RoleComply helps BC employers
RoleComply checks all postings against BC's pay range disclosure requirements and alerts your team when a posting is missing a pay range or salary history language appears in posting copy. For the annual reporting obligation, RoleComply's audit reports provide the historical posting data you need to support your pay transparency analysis.
What employers in British Columbia must do
The BC Government Pay Transparency is the authoritative source for compliance requirements in this jurisdiction. Regardless of the specific status of local legislation, employers in British Columbia should treat pay range disclosure as a baseline requirement today — the direction of travel is clear, and proactive employers are already ahead.
Audit all job postings. Pull every active role from your careers page, LinkedIn, Indeed, and any job boards or agencies posting on your behalf. Verify each posting includes a wage or salary range. Where ranges are missing, add them. Where ranges exist but are placeholder-wide, replace them with real, defensible figures connected to your compensation structure.
Build formal pay bands. The range you post must reflect what you would actually pay. This requires a compensation framework: roles mapped to levels, benchmarked externally, with documented criteria for where within a band an individual employee sits. Without this, you cannot post credible ranges consistently.
Remove salary history questions. Pay transparency legislation consistently prohibits asking candidates about their current or previous salary. Review your application forms, recruiter screening scripts, and any pre-employment questionnaires to ensure salary history questions have been removed entirely.
The business case for going further
Employers who post salary ranges report better application quality, faster time-to-fill, and stronger employer brand scores. Candidates self-select based on realistic expectations, offer acceptance rates improve, and internal pay equity conversations become easier when compensation is documented and transparent. The compliance obligation is the floor — the strategic opportunity is considerably higher.
Read our pay transparency fundamentals guide for the full picture, or see our remote work compliance guide for managing obligations across multiple Canadian provinces.
