How Long Should HR Keep Records of Former Employees? Seeking Clarity on Regulations

To the best of my knowledge, HR records of departed employees are typically retained for a maximum of 3 years. Are there any specific written rules or regulations regarding the duration for which HR records of former employees should be maintained? Your prompt update on this matter would be greatly appreciated.

Regards,
SREEHARIPRASAD.N
Manager HR
DHLI

Hi, as per your query, employee exit data will be kept for 5 years in accordance with the State/Central Government rules. If you have any inquiries regarding HR-related matters, feel free to contact me at any time.

Regards.

Dear Fellow member,

For exited employees, records can be kept for up to 7 years in storage. If you have the space, I don't think there is a specific rule that we need to follow in this respect. However, you could always go the extra mile and create an e-filing system for old records and store them in folders on an external disk. For example, scan all documents and maintain them on the disk; this way, you have a soft copy of the employee record, and the original hard document can be destroyed after some time. My advice is to always keep some form of evidence.

One easy approach to maintaining a soft copy of employee records is to scan any physical documents before filing them in a physical file. You can designate an external disk for this purpose and organize it into folders according to employee numbers.

Hi,

I have read about maintaining personnel records in one of the government orders. If the company does not maintain electronic data of the employees and does not issue payslip to the employee wherein the PF, ESI, and other benefits are explicitly mentioned, then the records have to be preserved at least for 25 years. This would be applicable to the conventional manufacturing sector. For IT/ITES/other recently developed sectors, 7 years is sufficient.

In some states in the USA, if the company fails to produce employees' personnel records to the court, then the company has to pay a huge penalty for not maintaining records of ex-employees.

In India, for salary, PF, and other purposes, the preservation rule is given under Sec 13A of the Payment of Wages Act, 1936. Every employer has to maintain registers and records of employee work performed by them, the wages paid to them, the deductions made from their wages, and it is mandatory to give a payslip to the employee.

Every register and record shall be preserved for a period of three years after the date of the last entry made therein.