Business Live reports that Investec, the niche private banking and wealth management group, has set minimum pay for its SA employees at just under R21,000 a month, becoming the latest company in the financial services sector to disclose its minimum pay. “We increased our minimum salary for employees in SA to R250,000 per annum, with effect from 1 June 2023,” the company said in its annual report released on Friday.

The increase in minimum pay for the group’s lowest earners does little to close the gap between the top 5% best-paid SA employees and the bottom 5%. The annual report shows that average single-figure total remuneration of top 5% SA-based employees was R10.1m per annum in the 2024 financial year, while the top 5% pocketed just R297,000. 

The group is also trying to close the gap in its gender pay. At the SA business, which was founded 50 years ago, the mean hourly pay gap reduced from 28.3% to 27.3%, while the median hourly gap dropped from 23% to 22.6%. The gender bonus gap reduced from a mean figure of 72.6% to 64.9%, while the median rate reduced from 18.9% to 7.6%. The mean figure represents the difference between the average of men’s and women’s pay expressed as a percentage of the average male pay, while median represents the difference between the midpoints in the ranges of men’s and women’s pay expressed as a percentage of the male midpoint.

Investec said its employment equity plan in SA would end during 2024, and the group was consulting with employees and other stakeholders to develop its next employment equity plan and “as at 31 March 2024, 50% of top management at Investec within SA were people of colour”.

by Kabelo Khumalo