The Pay Range Law Reference, One Row per Jurisdiction a Posting Touches

This is the lookup sheet for anyone applying to dozens of postings across US states, Canadian provinces, EU countries, and remote listings who needs to know, for each posting, whether pay had to be shown. Each row answers four questions from the applicant's side: what brings the listing under the rule, what a compliant range has to contain, when the employer must answer if you ask, and which recourse applies and how long you have. Where the public record is thin, the row says so and tells you what to check.

Which pay transparency law applies to a remote job?

The rule that applies depends on where the work is done, where the role reports, and in some places where the role could be filled from. It does not depend on where the employer is headquartered. One "Remote, US" posting can come under several state rules at once, and you check each one separately.

Three triggers do almost all the work:

• Work location. The job is done, at least in part, inside the jurisdiction.
• Reporting location. The job is done somewhere else but reports to a supervisor, office, or worksite inside the jurisdiction.
• Remote eligibility. Someone living in the jurisdiction could fill the role, whether or not the employer expects to hire there.

New York is the clearest example of the reporting trigger. The NY Department of Labor's Pay Transparency FAQ (P689) says a role done outside the state that reports to a New York supervisor or office is covered. So a fully remote job in Florida that reports to a Manhattan manager is a New York posting.

Washington and BC have the widest reach. Their test is who could fill the role, which pulls in most nationwide remote listings.

Some trackers mention two more triggers that the sources behind this reference do not establish. One covers work "predominantly performed for an office" in a jurisdiction. The other covers occasional presence in a state, such as travel. Do not rely on either without reading that state's statute.

Pay transparency laws for job seekers by state: who must post and who must answer

US rules come in two kinds. Proactive rules put the range in the posting itself. On-request rules only require the employer to give the range when you ask, or before an offer. Before deciding whether a missing range is a problem, find out which kind your row is.

Proactive disclosure states

One tracker counts fourteen jurisdictions that require a range in the posting:

• Colorado
• Illinois
• Maryland
• Washington
• Virginia
• District of Columbia
• Minnesota
• Maine
• California
• New York
• New Jersey
• Massachusetts
• Hawaii
• Vermont

Two more have scheduled start dates. Connecticut moves from on-request to proactive on October 1, 2026. Delaware's start is given as September 26, 2027 by one source and June 30, 2027 by another. Check whether these dates have passed and what the statute says before you treat either state as proactive.

On-request jurisdictions

• Rhode Island: the range is required when you ask, or before an offer.
• Connecticut (until its proactive rule starts): the range is given on request.
• Nevada: on-request, but the exact trigger is not established in the sources here. Read the statute before you rely on a deadline.
• Illinois, as a fallback: if no posting was made available to you, the employer must disclose the pay scale and benefits before any offer or discussion of pay.
• DC, for benefits: the employer must disclose that healthcare benefits exist before the first interview.

Headcount thresholds you will meet

Thresholds decide whether a small employer is covered at all:

• All employers: Colorado, Virginia (no headcount threshold, no revenue floor, no grandfathering), British Columbia
• 4 or more: New York (private employers)
• 5 or more: Jersey City
• 10 or more: New Jersey
• 15 or more: Washington, Illinois
• 25 or more: Massachusetts, Ontario
• 50: Hawaii, the highest in this set

New York City and Jersey City have local rules, but this reference does not have a sourced list of every city and county rule with its threshold. If the posting names a city, search that city's human rights or labor agency directly.

Can I ask for the salary range before an interview?

Yes, anywhere. The law only changes whether the employer has to answer and when. In Rhode Island the employer has to answer once you ask. In Illinois with no posting, the deadline is before any offer or pay discussion. Elsewhere, asking is a negotiation move, not a legal trigger. Either way, ask in writing, because a written request gives you a date to point to.

Does the range shown meet the jurisdiction's test?

A posted range can still fail. The three tests are whether it is open-ended, whether it includes a benefits description where one is required, and whether it is wider than an allowed spread. Only Ontario puts a hard number on width. Everywhere else, "too wide" is a judgement call.

Connecticut also requires a benefits description, according to the procedure sources behind this reference.

Good faith. In New York, a good-faith range is one the employer "legitimately believes they are willing to pay at the time of the advertisement's posting." This tells you what the employer intended when it posted, not what the job is worth. It misleads when a range was honest at posting time and the budget changed afterwards. That is not a violation of this test.

Open-ended. New York's proposed rules say a range "cannot be open ended (e.g., $20/hour and up)." This is the cleanest failure you will see, because no judgement is involved.

Benefits description. In Washington, Colorado, New Jersey, and Connecticut, a range without benefits text is incomplete. In New York, where only base pay is required, "great benefits" is fine. New Jersey says phrases like that do not count.

Spread cap. Ontario's cap is a bright line: a range wider than $50,000 a year fails, unless the expected pay or the top of the range is above $200,000. Above that point, the pay rule does not apply at all. BC has no limit on width.

There is a practical reason to care about ranges beyond legality. In Colorado, posted salaries rose 3.6% on average after the law took effect. A range is information, even when it is wide.

Recourse by US jurisdiction: complaint, lawsuit, or cure notice

What you can do about a missing or failing range depends on the row. Some states let applicants sue. Some only let you complain to an agency or the attorney general. Two require you to give written notice and wait out a cure window first. Find out which before you write anything.

Thresholds for these rows are listed in the US section above. A few points the table cannot hold:

• Washington. Statutory damages are "no less than $100 and no more than $5,000 per violation." Before you can seek penalties or damages, you must notify the employer in writing. If it corrects the posting within five business days, penalties and damages are off the table. Notice from any person about a particular posting counts as notice for the life of that posting, so someone else may already have started, and used up, the window. One secondary source gives a three-year limitation period. That is not checked against the statute.
• Virginia. The cure covers postings only. It does not cover salary history questions or retaliation. The employer cures by fixing the posting in the original posting locations, so check every channel, not just the careers page.
• Colorado. Enforcement is administrative only. The complaint goes to the state agency, within one year.
• DC. There is no private right of action, but the attorney general may sue.
• Massachusetts. The attorney general enforces. Penalties start with a written warning, then up to $500, then up to $1,000, and up to $25,000 for repeat violations.
• Jersey City. Fines go up to $2,000 per violation.
• A city commission (probably New York City, unverified). One source describes no penalty for a first violation cured within 30 days, and up to $250,000 for repeat violations. Confirm which agency it is before you rely on that.

Filing deadlines for the other states are not publicly established in the sources here.

That number explains the cure windows. When every applicant could claim statutory damages, the legislature added a step: the applicant's written notice now comes before any remedy. Virginia launched with the same idea and a longer window.

The salary history question is the one violation an employer cannot fix afterwards. Virginia's cure applies to postings, so a history question asked in an interview creates exposure that no later correction removes. If you are asked one in Virginia, write down the date, who asked, and the exact words.

In Washington and Virginia, nothing happens until an applicant puts a dated notice in writing.

Who reads your request on the other side

Expect your request or notice to land with a generalist. In Refolk's index of professional profiles, very few compensation people present pay transparency as their specialty.

The US group is 11.9 times the size of the Canadian one, but the comparison is skewed. In a 25-profile sample of the Canadian group, 21 work for the Government of Canada, so "Compensation Specialist" there leans toward federal payroll roles. Treat all of this as a weak signal about who handles postings, not a measure of how employers comply. The practical lesson is that the reader of your notice may not know the rule, so name the statute and the trigger in the first paragraph.

Ontario and British Columbia: the Canadian rows

Ontario and BC both require pay in postings but test it very differently. Ontario has a size threshold, a hard spread cap, and extra disclosures. BC covers every employer and puts no limit on width. Other provinces are not covered by the sources behind this reference.

Ontario. The headcount is taken on the day the posting goes up. Part-time staff and staff on leave each count as one. Besides the range, a covered posting must say whether AI is used and whether the vacancy actually exists. Applicants who were interviewed must be told the hiring outcome within 45 days. If you were interviewed in Ontario, put day 45 in your calendar. It is a clock running in your favour.

British Columbia. The rule covers postings open to BC residents that may ever be filled by a BC resident, in person or remotely. General "help wanted" posters and recruitment campaigns that do not advertise a specific opportunity do not have to comply. The BC government's "Pay Transparency in B.C." page is the place to confirm the current scope.

Recourse. The sources behind this reference do not establish the complaint path or deadline for either province. Before relying on a deadline, check with the provincial employment standards office for the work location.

EU postings under Directive 2023/970

For an EU posting, you can only rely on national law, not on the directive alone. As of one tracker's 28 September 2026 snapshot, only 5 of 27 member states had enacted transposing laws (national laws that put the directive into effect).

• Enacted: Greece, Italy (Legislative Decree 96/2026), Lithuania, Malta (Legal Notice 173 of 2026), Slovakia
• Partial: Estonia, covering recruitment pay information, the salary-history ban, and the right to discuss pay
• Greece: obligations apply from 1 November 2026
• Sweden: reported as not currently intending to submit a bill

What is not established matters as much. The sources here do not show, country by country, whether the range must appear in the advert itself or only before the interview. One vendor tracker says ranges "become mandatory in job adverts," but that is a summary, not the law. Read Article 5 of Directive (EU) 2023/970 on EUR-Lex, then the national law for the country where the job is.

In member states that have not transposed, the directive by itself may not give a job seeker a claim against a private employer. That is a legal inference, not a settled point. Confirm it with a local employment lawyer before you act on it.

How to check a posting, step by step

The check takes a few minutes per posting, and most of that is the headcount lookup. Run it before you decide whether to apply, ask, or send notice. It works best on postings you already plan to pursue, because notice and escalation only make sense where you have an interest. When you are tailoring a resume and cover letter for every listing, Refolk handles that drafting, which leaves time for this check on the postings that matter.

Sources disagree on the order of the last two steps. In Washington, the written notice must come before any remedy. In Colorado, the agency complaint is the first formal step. Follow the row, not a general rule.

Subject: Pay range for [job title], requisition [ID]

Hi [name],

Thank you for moving me forward for the [job title] role ([posting link]). Before we go further, could you share the pay range for this position and a description of the benefits that come with it?

The posting I applied through did not include a range. I am based in [state or province], and the role is listed as [work location or remote eligibility].

Thanks,
[Your name]

Subject: Pay range missing from posting for [job title], [requisition ID]

To [employer legal name], recruiting and HR:

On [date], I viewed and applied to the posting for [job title] at [URL], also published at [other channels].

The posting does not include [a wage or salary range / a general description of benefits].

The role [is performed in / may be filled by a resident of / reports to an office in] [Washington or Virginia], which I understand brings it under [RCW 49.58.110 or Virginia Code § 40.1-28.7:12].

I am giving written notice so the posting can be corrected in each place it was published. I have kept a dated copy of the posting as it appeared.

[Your name]
[Contact details]
Sent: [date]

How this goes wrong: false positives and dead clocks

Most mistakes in this work are false positives. The applicant calls a posting illegal when the trigger, the source, or the test does not support it. The other big failure is a notice that never started the clock. Check each item below before you claim a violation.

• Misreading the work-location trigger. A "Remote, US" posting from a Texas company looks exempt. But Washington coverage applies if a Washington-based employee could fill the role, and a line saying Washington applicants will not be accepted does not avoid the requirement. Check the posting's list of eligible states against each row, not the employer's address.
• Treating a scrape as the employer's posting. A missing range on an aggregator is not proof of a violation. New York does not hold employers responsible for postings scraped or aggregated by a third party without their knowledge or consent, and Washington's definition of a posting excludes listings replicated without the employer's consent. Check the careers page. If the range is there, the aggregator copy is probably a scrape. The exception does not cover recruiters or job sites posting on the employer's behalf. Those count as the employer's postings in New York.
• Calling a wide range illegal. Width is a violation only where the test says so. Ontario has a hard cap. BC has none. New York faults ranges so broad they stop you understanding "the legitimate compensation the employer is willing to pay," which is a judgement call. Do not call a BC range illegal for its width.
• Applying the wrong benefits standard. "Great benefits" passes in New York, where only base pay is required, and fails in New Jersey, which says such phrases do not count. Check which row the posting is under before you flag the benefits line.
• A notice that never started the clock. A notice that is not written, or that went to the wrong inbox, may not count. In Washington, someone else's notice may already have used up the window for that posting. In Virginia, recheck every original posting location before deciding the employer did not cure.
• Trusting a single tracker. Trackers disagree on which states count, on Virginia's bill number (SB 215 and HB 636 in most sources, HB 1659 and SB 370 in one), and on Delaware's start date. Confirm against the statute or the state labor agency before you act.
• Reading too much into index counts. The Canadian compensation group in Refolk's index leans toward federal payroll roles (21 of 25 sampled), so the 11.9x US-to-Canada ratio is not a like-for-like comparison.

Keeping this reference current

Several rows have dates built in, so this reference goes stale on a schedule. Before relying on a row, check whether any scheduled change has passed, and check the primary source, not a tracker.

Dates to re-check:

• Connecticut's proactive rule: October 1, 2026. After that date, treat Connecticut as proactive and drop it from the on-request list.
• Washington's cure provision: scheduled to end July 27, 2027. After that, check whether written notice is still required before a remedy.
• Delaware's start: September 26, 2027 or June 30, 2027, depending on the source. Read the statute.
• Greece: obligations apply from 1 November 2026.
• EU transposition: the five-country count is a single tracker's snapshot. Look up the country's national law directly.

Primary sources to bookmark: the NY DOL Pay Transparency FAQ (P689), the Washington SSB 5408 House Bill Report, Virginia Code § 40.1-28.7:12, Ontario ESA Part III.1 with O. Reg. 476/24, the BC government's pay transparency page, and Directive (EU) 2023/970 on EUR-Lex.

When you run a high-volume search, record the jurisdiction row next to each application, so you can tell at a glance which postings owe you a range, which owe you an answer, and which have a clock running. Refolk keeps the resume and cover letter tailored to each posting. This row is the extra field that turns a no-salary listing into a decision.