Gender pay gap statement

EPM Ltd – Reported and published in April 2024
Based upon the snapshot date of April 2023 (covering May 2022 to April 2023)

Introduction From Jen Elliott, CEO

At EPM we are a business where everyone is welcome, with people at the centre of all we do. At the core of working for EPM is our belief that we do things the right way and treat everyone fairly. Diversity and inclusion are key components of how we work. We believe that this reporting requirement by the government is an excellent catalyst for organisations across the UK to continue to focus on diversity, inclusion, and equality.

Our gender pay gap report is shown below. We have taken several steps to reduce our gap, however we acknowledge that we still have work to do. I am proud of our people, team and culture and remain
fully committed to closing this gap through our action plan.

Gender Pay Gap Commentary

EPM is a leading HR, Payroll, Finance, Leadership, and Consultancy service provider to schools across England and Wales. Most of our colleagues (82%) are female, which is reflected across our senior
leadership teams and is very much reflective of the education sector we operate within. We recognise the benefits of having a diverse and inclusive workforce, and our talent strategy focuses on attracting
the best people regardless of gender, ethnicity, age, beliefs, and background. Our actions below are our focus on how we close this gap.

When reading the below table, it is important to note the below which impacts our data:

• Hourly pay includes bonus and commission
• The hourly gender pay gap is reported after salary sacrifice. We offer salary sacrifice in the form of childcare vouchers, additional leave, pension, and cycle to work. The majority of
  our workforce that choose to participate in salary sacrifice are female. Without this reduction in salary, which is offered to help colleagues and has been entered into voluntarily, the pay gap would be reduced.
• Our bonus and commission schemes are transparent and are based upon objective, quantifiable and fair performance metrics. Whilst men make up the largest proportion within the roles which attract greater commission, we are delighted to report that today (2023) 50% of this population are female.

We have progressed from last year though we will not start to see the reduction in the pay gap again until next year at the earliest (April 2025 Report based upon the snapshot of April 2024).

What Is The Gender Pay Gap?

The Gender Pay Gap measures the difference in the average pay of women and men across the business according to how each individual has chosen to identify. It does not measure ‘equal pay’, which is the right for men and women to be paid the same when doing the same or equivalent work. We are an equal pay employer and are fully compliant with this legal requirement.

What Are We Doing About This?

We want to improve the working lives of our people, and we believe a focus not just on gender, but on diversity and inclusion in the broadest sense is what will enable us to achieve this. As a starting point,
we are fully focused on our gender balance across the business, and we want to address this by focusing on the following areas:

Recruitment and Succession

We continue to improve our recruitment and selection methods and are focused on our strong succession and talent planning processes. To support this, we focus on the training and development
of all line managers.

Training and Development

We are focused on building our leader’s understanding of great leadership and coaching through training and development. We believe this develops better leaders of our culture and all people, regardless of our differences in thought, style, gender, ethnicity, background or generation. During 2023 we hosted leadership training for our team managers and senior leaders.

Representation

Our work will continue to be driven by data and insights, and we will build on the progress we have made by collating data through the functionality of our HRIS System.

Regular conversations and our strong people processes continue to be at the heart of how we spot talent and develop our people. We believe everyone has the potential to play to their strengths, broaden skills or move into a new role. Through our people planning and talent reviews, we continue to track and review all talent pipelines and the associated gender mix to ensure we have a gender balance across our business.

What Does the Data Tell us?

Our data for 2023 indicates that the headline figure for median gender pay gap in our total workforce has seen a relatively significant change, moving from our male colleagues being 24% more than our
female colleagues in 2022, to our female colleagues now seeing median hourly pay 4% higher than our male colleagues. We recognise that the median figure is a better representation of the overall gender
pay gap as it is not impacted as much by outlying values. Our gender pay gap has reduced since the first reporting year in 2023.

I confirm that the above information is accurate.

Jen Elliott

Chief Executive Officer