Managing Monthly Compliance for 600+ Workers: How Do You Keep Up with the Paperwork?

Dear All,

I am working in an organization in Gujarat where more than 80 contractors are employed, engaging a total of 600+ workers for various tasks. As per policy, all contractors are required to submit statutory labor law compliance documents along with their bills, including muster copies, wage registers, bank statements showing wage disbursements, PF challans along with PF ECR, and remittance slips.

I am responsible for cross-checking these documents and maintaining the records. It can be challenging to keep this data up to date on a monthly basis. I am seeking guidance from experienced and knowledgeable members on how to effectively update the data and maintain proper records monthly.

Regards,
Tejas Thakaria

If there are 600 contract workers, obviously, there should be more than 2,000 regular employees. You can add a few HR/Personnel Executives to verify the bills and supporting documents. You can also keep different dates for payment to different contractors so that you will get enough time to process the payments. Other than these, I don't find any practical solution for your query.

You can change the current software and purchase new payroll software. It will provide all compliance data automatically in the system. You will be instructed to ensure all contractors pay the compliance as per my sheet.

Thanks & Regards,
Pravin Solanki

Dear Pravin Solanki,

Which software can capture the payments made by the contractors (80 in number) to ESI and PF, and ensure that all workers have been paid wages at the government-fixed rate, including overtime wages, holidays, rest days, etc.?

I would suggest going for CLMS (Contract Labor Management Software). For further updates, you can get in touch with me, and I will guide you. We have implemented this software in our organization, and it is running successfully. All attendance is being captured online through a biometric system, and wages are available at the click of a button, including all statutory compliances. As a principal employer, we are only facilitating the software, and all access rights have been given to the contractors. We can deduct even a minor or token amount from the contractor's bill for providing attendance capturing services through the biometric device. This strategy will ensure that the contract laborers engaged are not in disguise, and the contract remains in the hands of the contractor, with the company merely acting as a facilitator.

For developing such software, the scope will vary from company to company, and the HR team needs to prepare a robust SOP.

Regards,
Hilary Joseph

Issue with Attendance Marking and Payment Verification

The issue is not with regard to attendance marking. It is easy to mark attendance using a biometric system. The major issue is with regard to capturing or verifying the payments made by the contractors to ESI, PF, etc. Will the software show the amount payable to each worker along with deductions made, but will it show the amount actually remitted by the contractors to their employees and ESI and EPF?

Moreover, the challans in support of the payments to ESI and EPF will be a common one meant for one contractor and it shall contain the employees under him working for various organizations including yours. From the challan/ECR produced, you have to verify whether all the employees engaged in your plant are available in the ECRs or the names highlighted by the contractor in the ECR are correct or not.

Similarly, the principal employer will get a statement of wage remittance to the bank. You have to cross-check whether all the workers put to work in your plant have received wages by physically verifying the entries. Will this function be available in your CLMS (Contract Labor Management Software)?