The HR & Payroll Terms Nepali Teams Actually Use

Absenteeism rate measures unplanned absence: days lost to unscheduled absence divided by the days that should have been worked, expressed as a percentage. Planned leave is excluded, because it is not the thing being measured.

An allowance is a regular payment made on top of basic salary for a specific purpose, such as dearness, transport or communication. Allowances count as taxable earnings but are excluded from the base used for PF, SSF, gratuity and overtime.

The annual bonus is a share of an enterprise's net profit distributed to its employees under the Bonus Act 2030. Ten percent of net profit is set aside for the purpose, and what remains after distribution goes to welfare funds.

An applicant tracking system is software that manages hiring from job posting to offer: applications in one place, candidates moving through defined stages, and a record of who decided what.

Attendance regularisation is the process for correcting an attendance record: a missed punch, a forgotten check-out, a day spent at a client site. The employee raises it, a manager approves it, and the corrected record carries an audit trail.

Attrition rate is the proportion of employees who leave over a period, usually expressed annually. It is calculated as leavers divided by average headcount for the period, times one hundred.

Basic salary is the fixed core of an employee's pay, before allowances, overtime and bonuses. In Nepal it is also the base every statutory contribution is assessed on, which makes it the most consequential number in a salary structure.

Biometric attendance records a punch using a physical identifier such as a fingerprint or a face, on a device at the workplace. Because the identifier cannot be handed to a colleague, it removes buddy punching, which is the main weakness of card and register systems.

The Citizen Investment Trust is a voluntary retirement savings scheme employees can join on top of PF or SSF. An employee elects to contribute up to 33% of basic salary, and the contribution reduces taxable income within the shared retirement ceiling.

Cost to company is the total annual cost of employing someone: gross salary plus the employer's own statutory contributions, festival expense, and any benefit the company funds. It is always higher than gross, and higher again than net pay.

Onboarding is everything between an accepted offer and a new employee being productive: paperwork, identifiers, access, equipment, introductions and the first pieces of work. It is a process with owners and dates, not a first-day checklist.

Employee self-service lets staff handle their own routine HR tasks: view a payslip, check a leave balance, apply for leave, update their details. It removes the queue of small requests that otherwise lands on HR.

Nepal's Labour Act 2074 recognises five employment types: regular, work-based, time-bound, casual and part-time. The type decides how the contract can end, what entitlements apply, and what has to be in writing.

eTDS is the Inland Revenue Department's electronic format for withholding returns. It reports, employee by employee and against each personal PAN, how much tax the employer withheld and deposited for the period.

Festival expense is a statutory payment of one month's basic remuneration, made once a year at the festival the employee celebrates. It is the Nepali equivalent of a thirteenth-month salary, and it is an entitlement under the Labour Act 2074 rather than a discretionary bonus.

Full and final settlement is the closing calculation when an employee leaves: salary for days worked, leave encashment, any dues owed to them, less any recoveries, paid once every clearance is complete.

GPS attendance records a check-in from an employee's phone along with their location, usually constrained to a defined area. It covers field staff, site engineers and branch teams who are nowhere near a biometric device.

Gratuity is a retirement benefit an employer funds throughout an employee's service rather than paying as a lump sum at exit. Under the Labour Act 2074 the employer deposits 8.33% of basic salary every month into the Social Security Fund or an approved retirement fund.

Gross salary is an employee's total earnings for a period before any deduction: basic salary plus every allowance, overtime and taxable benefit. It is the figure most offer letters quote and the one employees compare against.

Home leave is Nepal's annual paid leave entitlement. Under the Labour Act 2074 an employee earns one day of home leave for every twenty days worked, and unused days accumulate up to a ceiling of ninety.

An HRIS, or human resource information system, is the system of record for employee data: profiles, contracts, documents, reporting lines and history. It stores and reports; an HRMS adds the workflows on top.

An HRMS, or human resource management system, is software that holds employee data and runs the workflows around it: payroll, attendance, leave, performance and the approvals that connect them.

Nepal's personal income tax is charged at marginal rates across annual income bands. For FY 2083/84 the first NPR 1,000,000 is taxed at 1%, rising through the bands to a top marginal rate of 29%.

The Inland Revenue Department is Nepal's tax administration, responsible for income tax, VAT and excise. For payroll it is the body that publishes the tax slabs, issues PANs, receives monthly withholding deposits and defines the eTDS format.

The Labour Act 2074 is Nepal's principal employment statute, in force since 2074 BS (2017 AD) and applied together with the Labour Rules 2075. It sets employment types, working hours, overtime, leave entitlements, probation and notice, and the funded gratuity and social security model.

Leave encashment is the conversion of an unused leave balance into money. In Nepal it applies to home leave that has accumulated beyond the ninety-day ceiling, and to the remaining balance when an employee leaves.

Maternity leave in Nepal is ninety-eight days under the Labour Act 2074, of which sixty days are paid at full remuneration. It can begin before the expected delivery date, and the entitlement is the employee's regardless of length of service.

The minimum wage is the lowest remuneration an employer in Nepal may lawfully pay, fixed by the Government of Nepal on the recommendation of the Minimum Remuneration Fixation Committee. It is published as a basic component plus a dearness allowance and is revised on a recurring cycle.

Mourning leave is thirteen days of leave granted to an employee who has to perform funeral rites, under Nepal's Labour Act 2074. It is commonly called kriya bida.

Nepal's fiscal year runs from the first of Shrawan to the last day of Ashad in the Bikram Sambat calendar, which is roughly mid-July to mid-July in the Gregorian calendar. Tax slabs, leave accrual, bonuses and annual returns all follow it.

Net pay is the amount that actually reaches an employee's bank account: gross salary minus the retirement contribution, any voluntary CIT election, monthly TDS, and any other authorised deduction such as a salary advance.

A notice period is the time between notifying the other party that employment will end and the last working day. In Nepal the requirement depends on the ground for ending the engagement and on what the contract says.

Offboarding is the process of ending employment properly: handover, asset recovery, access revocation, clearance from each department, the exit conversation, and the final settlement.

Overtime is time worked beyond the standard eight-hour day or forty-eight-hour week. Under Nepal's Labour Act 2074 it is paid at one and a half times basic remuneration and is capped at four hours a day and twenty-four hours a week.

A PAN is the taxpayer identification number issued by Nepal's Inland Revenue Department. Every employee needs a personal PAN for the tax withheld from their salary to be credited to them, and every employer needs a business PAN to deposit it.

Paternity leave in Nepal is fifteen days of paid leave for an employee whose spouse has given birth, granted under the Labour Act 2074. It is sometimes referred to as maternity care leave.

The payroll cycle is the repeating sequence a company runs each pay period: collect attendance and leave, calculate earnings and deductions, approve, pay, and file. In Nepal it runs on Bikram Sambat months and carries a statutory deadline at the end.

A payslip is the statement an employer issues each pay period showing earnings, deductions and net pay. In Nepal it is the employee's proof of income and of the tax and contributions withheld on their behalf.

Probation is the initial period during which an employer assesses a new employee before confirming them. Nepal's Labour Act 2074 caps it at six months, after which the employee is confirmed or the engagement ends.

The Provident Fund is a retirement savings deposit held at the Employees Provident Fund (Karmachari Sanchaya Kosh). The employee contributes 10% of basic salary, the employer matches it with another 10%, and the combined 20% is deposited monthly against the employee's PF number.

Public holidays are the days off an employer must grant in addition to the weekly rest day. The Labour Act 2074 sets thirteen days a year, with one additional day for female employees, and the specific dates follow the government's annual calendar.

A salary bank transfer file is the formatted list of employee accounts and amounts a company uploads to its bank to pay everyone in one instruction, instead of entering transfers one by one.

A shift roster is the published schedule of who works which shift on which day. It is what attendance is measured against: without a roster, a punch at 14:00 cannot be classified as on time or late.

Sick leave is paid leave for illness. Under Nepal's Labour Act 2074 an employee is entitled to twelve days a year at full remuneration, and unused days accumulate up to forty-five.

The Social Security Fund is Nepal's contributory social security scheme. Employer and employee together deposit 31% of the employee's basic salary every month (11% from the employee, 20% from the employer), and that pool pays out medical, accident, dependent-family and old-age benefits.

The social security tax is the 1% charged on the first NPR 1,000,000 of a resident individual's annual income. It is collected through payroll like ordinary income tax, and it is waived for employees who contribute to the Social Security Fund.

TDS is income tax withheld by the employer from an employee's salary each month and deposited with the Inland Revenue Department on the employee's behalf. It is calculated on annual projected income and spread across the year, not charged month by month in isolation.

Nepal's Labour Act 2074 sets working hours at eight a day and forty-eight a week, with at least one day of rest each week. Time worked beyond that is overtime and carries the higher rate.