Payroll Maintenance

Payroll is the most regulated, most error-intolerant, and most morale-sensitive process in any Indian business. Salary structure drives in-hand take-home and tax efficiency. Provident Fund (12% employee + 12% employer), ESIC (0.75% employee + 3.25% employer), Professional Tax, Labour Welfare Fund and TDS under Section 192 all have separate due dates, separate forms, separate authorities, and separate consequences for non-compliance. Add the Maternity Benefit Act, the Payment of Gratuity Act, the four labour codes (Wages, Industrial Relations, Social Security, OSH&WC), and you have a process where one missed challan triggers interest, penalty, and employee distrust simultaneously.

Most SMBs run payroll in Excel or on a junior accountant's laptop, and discover the consequences only at year-end Form 16 distribution — when withholding mismatches surface in employees' Form 26AS / AIS, advance-tax demands arrive, and PF withdrawal claims get rejected for missing UAN linkage. By then the damage is reputational as much as financial.

We run payroll as a managed service on production-grade tools — greytHR, Zoho Payroll, Keka, RazorpayX Payroll, or Tally Payroll — with statutory deposits, returns, and Form 16 issuance bundled. Predictable, auditable, on time, every month.

What's Inside Managed Payroll

• Salary Structure & Take-Home Optimisation:: Basic / HRA / LTA / special / variable / reimbursements / NPS Tier-I employer / meal vouchers / mobile / books — structured under both old and new regimes; tax-efficient under each employee's election.

• Monthly Salary Computation:: Attendance / leave inputs, LOP, bonus / variable, arrears, full-and-final settlements, joiners / leavers prorated, HRA exemption (with rent receipts where applicable), 80C / 80D investment proofs at year-end, regime selection per employee.

• Statutory Deductions:: PF 12% + 12% (with cap on basic ₹15,000 for excluded employees); ESIC 0.75% + 3.25% on gross up to ₹21,000 (₹25,000 for differently-abled); state-specific PT slabs; LWF half-yearly / annual; TDS Section 192 with monthly averaging.

• Statutory Deposits:: PF challan ECR by 15th; ESIC challan by 15th; PT by state-specific due date; TDS u/s 192 by 7th of following month; LWF half-yearly / annual — direct deposit, challan archive, reconciliation against books.

• Returns & Filings:: Form 24Q quarterly TDS return (with annexures I + II); EPF ECR (monthly); ESIC contribution return (monthly); PT returns (state-specific); LWF returns; Form 16 Part A (TRACES) + Part B (manual) consolidated and issued by 15 June.

• Section 192 / 192A / 192B / 192C Discipline:: 192 (employer salary TDS, monthly averaging method), 192A (PF withdrawal TDS by EPFO if <5 years), 192B (concessional TDS for Indian shipping crew), 192C (specified employer for retirement bodies) — each handled correctly where applicable.

• Maternity, Gratuity & Leave:: 26-week paid maternity (Maternity Benefit Act), 5-year-vested gratuity at 15 days × last drawn × completed years (Payment of Gratuity Act, ₹20 lakh tax-free cap), leave encashment policy aligned to Section 10(10AA).

• Tools & Self-Service Portal:: greytHR / Zoho Payroll / Keka / RazorpayX Payroll / Tally Payroll deployed; employee self-service for pay slips, Form 16, investment declarations, leave; manager workflows for approvals.

• Reconciliation & Audit:: Salary register vs books; PF / ESIC paid vs liability; TDS deposited vs Form 24Q vs Form 26AS — three-way reconciliation every quarter, ready for statutory audit and assessment.

Where Self-Run Payroll Fails

UAN not linked to Aadhaar — withdrawals rejected. PF deposited late — interest u/s 7Q + damages u/s 14B. TDS deposited but not reported in 24Q — Form 26AS mismatch with employee. ESIC eligibility miscalculated. PT slab applied for the wrong state. Form 16 issued late. We close all of these at month one.