Glossary
Attendance and payroll glossary for Indian employers
Every term a payroll register throws at an Indian employer, defined once, in plain English, with the arithmetic spelled out in rupees.
Attendance and time
How presence is recorded and read: check-in and check-out, geofencing, shifts, grace periods, late marks and half days.
- Biometric attendanceBiometric attendance is recording a shift by reading a physical trait, usually a fingerprint, a face or an iris, on a device fixed at the entrance.
- GeofencingGeofencing is drawing a circle of a chosen radius around a work location and accepting an attendance punch only when the employee's phone reports a position inside that circle.
- GPS attendanceGPS attendance is marking a working day from a phone, where the app reads the device's satellite position at the instant of the punch and stores it alongside the check-in time.
- Half dayA half day is a working day on which an employee is present for only part of the shift and is counted for half the day's pay.
- Late markA late mark is the entry an employer records when an employee checks in after the shift start time and after whatever grace minutes the policy allows.
- Overnight shiftAn overnight shift is a shift that begins on one calendar date and ends on the next, such as 9:00 pm to 6:00 am.
- Shift grace periodA shift grace period is a fixed window after the shift start time in which a check-in is still treated as on time.
Leave and holidays
Leave types an Indian employer usually runs, plus weekly offs, national and festival holidays, and what happens when leave runs out.
- Casual leaveCasual leave, usually written CL, is paid time off an employer grants for short personal reasons that arrive at little notice: a bank errand, a family matter, a day of travel.
- Comp offComp off, short for compensatory off, is a paid day away from work given to an employee who worked on a day they were entitled to keep free, such as a weekly off or a declared...
- Earned leaveEarned leave is paid leave an employee builds up by working, credited in proportion to days actually worked rather than granted upfront at the start of the year.
- Loss of payLoss of pay, usually written LOP, is a day an employee is absent with no leave balance or approval to cover it, so the employer pays nothing for that day.
- National and festival holidaysNational and festival holidays are the days a business declares closed with pay for the year.
- Sick leaveSick leave is paid time off an employee draws when they are unwell, under treatment, or advised rest by a doctor.
- Weekly offA weekly off is the rest day in each week on which an employee is not required to work.
Salary and payroll
The parts of a monthly pay figure: gross, net, basic, allowances, payable days, pro-rata pay, overtime and the payroll cycle.
- Basic salaryBasic salary is the fixed core component of a monthly pay structure, before house rent allowance, dearness allowance and any other allowance is added on top.
- CTCCTC, short for cost to company, is the total annual amount an employer expects to spend on one employee.
- Dearness allowanceDearness allowance, written DA on a salary slip, is a pay component that moves with the cost of living.
- Gross salaryGross salary is the total of everything an employee earns for a month before a single deduction is taken off: the fixed structure of basic pay and allowances, plus whatever was...
- House rent allowanceHouse rent allowance, printed as HRA on most salary slips, is an earning component an employer pays a salaried employee towards the rent of their home.
- Net salaryNet salary is what is left of a month's earnings after every deduction the employer is required or authorised to make has come off.
- Overtime payOvertime pay is the extra amount an employer pays for hours worked beyond the normal daily or weekly hours fixed for a job.
- Payable daysPayable days are the number of days a monthly salary is spread across, and the number of days in a given month the employee is actually paid for.
- Payroll cycleA payroll cycle is the repeating span a business pays for, together with the two dates that close it: the day attendance stops being counted for that span, and the day the money...
- Pro-rata salaryPro-rata salary is the share of a monthly salary an employee earns when they are on the payroll for only part of the month, or on two different salary rates inside it.
Wages and advances
Pay that is not a fixed monthly salary: daily wages, piece rate, and salary advances with their recovery.
- Advance recoveryAdvance recovery is the taking back of a salary advance through fixed deductions from later pay.
- Daily wageA daily wage is an amount fixed for one day of work and paid for each day the worker actually attends.
- Piece rate wageA piece rate wage pays for output.
- Salary advanceA salary advance is money handed to an employee before the pay it belongs to falls due, taken back from later salaries.
Statutory and compliance
Deductions and obligations Indian law places on employers, including EPF, ESI, professional tax, TDS, gratuity, bonus and minimum wages.
- EPFEPF, the Employees' Provident Fund, is a retirement savings account run for employees under the Employees' Provident Funds and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952.
- ESIESI, the Employees' State Insurance, is a contributory scheme under the Employees' State Insurance Act, 1948 that gives covered workers medical care and cash benefits during...
- Form 16Form 16 is the certificate an employer gives a salaried employee after the financial year closes, showing the salary paid, the tax deducted from it and the tax deposited with the...
- GratuityGratuity is a lump sum an employer pays an employee for long unbroken service, under the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972.
- Minimum wagesMinimum wages are the lowest wage an employer may lawfully pay for a given kind of work, fixed by the appropriate government under the Minimum Wages Act, 1948 and carried forward...
- Professional taxProfessional tax is a tax on employment levied by some Indian states and collected by the employer out of the employee's monthly salary.
- Statutory bonusStatutory bonus is an annual payment an eligible employee is entitled to under the Payment of Bonus Act, 1965, worked out on the wages earned during an accounting year.
- TDS on salaryTDS on salary is income tax that an employer deducts from an employee's monthly pay and deposits with the government on that employee's behalf, under the Income Tax Act, 1961.
Documents and records
The paperwork a business keeps and hands over: salary slips, attendance registers, muster rolls and full and final settlements.
- Attendance registerAn attendance register is the day-by-day record of who was present, absent, late or on leave across a wage period.
- Full and final settlementA full and final settlement is the closing payment made when an employee leaves, covering everything still owed in both directions.
- Muster rollA muster roll is the daily attendance register an employer keeps under labour rules, listing each worker by name with the days worked and the hours put in during a wage period.
- Salary slipA salary slip is the statement an employer gives an employee for one wage period, setting out what was earned, what was deducted and what was paid.
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