International Women’s Day was disrupted this week by a Gender Pay Gap Bot that has highlighted the gender pay gap in companies promoting gender equality on social media.
Each time a company in the U.K posted about International Women’s Day using hashtags including #IWD2022 and #BreakTheBias, the Twitter account, Gender Pay Gap Bot, retweeted the post stating how women’s median hourly pay compared to men’s at the company.
The Gender Pay Gap Bot was created by Francesca Lawson, a copywriter and her partner, Ali Fensome, a software consultant.
The bot is exposing just how big some of the gender pay gaps are at companies that are using their social media to spruik their female employees and gender equality, on International Women’s Day. Currently, it has more than 215,000 followers.
“Employers, if you tweet about International Women’s Day, I’ll retweet your gender pay gap 👀” the account’s bio reads.
Data on gender pay gaps is publicly available in the U.K, where companies with more than 250 employees need to report on their employees’ pay.
Francesca Lawson, the co-creator of the bot, told Fortune she decided to do it because she was annoyed at the double standards in some companies.
“What I get annoyed at with International Women’s Day and any awareness event that is linked to a social issue, so say Pride, Black History Month, it’s all the same. Companies will show their support across all their comms and their social media, but they don’t provide any data or evidence to show what they are doing to challenge discrimination,” she said.