Payroll for hospitals & clinics
Payroll software for hospitals that never close
A hospital's attendance register does not look like an office's. Nurses rotate between morning, evening and night duty, ward staff work on Sundays and festivals, and handovers run late. Swastik Payroll turns that register into department-wise salary, PF and ESIC figures without a rota spreadsheet in between.
The problem
Why hospital payroll takes longer than it should
Most of the effort goes into reading attendance correctly, not into the salary formula. These are the places where it usually goes wrong.
Night duty splits across two dates
A nurse who punches in at 9:55 PM and out at 6:10 AM looks like two half days in a date-wise sheet. Someone has to join them by hand.
Rotas change every week
The same staff nurse may do mornings this week and nights the next. Late marks and overtime depend on which shift she was actually on.
Duty on offs and holidays
Wards run on Sundays, Holi and Diwali. Duty on a weekly off or holiday has to be paid, and it is easy to miss when rosters are kept on paper.
Handover overtime
Emergency cases and late reliefs keep staff back after shift end. Those extra hours are rarely written down the same way twice.
Costs by department
Management wants to know what the ICU, OPD, lab, pharmacy and housekeeping cost each month, not just one total.
Two very different pay levels
Doctors sit well above the ESIC wage limit while ward attendants, cleaners and security staff usually sit below it. Coverage has to be checked person by person.
How Swastik Payroll handles it
Each problem, and the feature that deals with it
| Hospital situation | What Swastik Payroll does |
|---|---|
| Night shifts that cross midnight | A shift can be marked as overnight (for example 10 PM to 6 AM), so the evening punch and the morning punch count as one duty. |
| Rotating rosters | Shifts are assigned to each employee with effective dates. Move a nurse from mornings to nights from the 5th and earlier days keep their old shift. |
| Punches from the biometric machine | Punches sync every minute from biometric attendance systems that store punches in a database; the first punch is the in time and the last is the out time. Compatibility is confirmed during the demo. |
| Weekly off and holiday duty | Attendance statuses include present on weekly off, present on holiday and both together. Full-day duty on such days is counted and paid as Sunday duty in the monthly salary record. |
| Staying back after shift | Overtime hours are measured beyond the end time of the shift the employee was assigned that day, including overnight shifts. |
| Department-wise payroll | Departments with sub-departments (Nursing → ICU, Ward 3) filter the payment report and payroll exports. |
| Staff who cannot reach the machine | Mobile punch from the phone browser records GPS location and waits for HR approval before it counts. |
| PF and ESIC for support staff | The statutory report works out EPF, EPS and EDLI wages and ESIC for employees with gross wages up to ₹21,000, with an ECR file and an ESIC contribution CSV. |
Example
A sample month for a ward attendant
This is a worked example with sample figures, not a real employee. A ward attendant on a monthly base salary of ₹13,500 does night duty in October 2026.
- Per-day rate: ₹13,500 ÷ 30 = ₹450
- 2 days absent: 2 × ₹450 = ₹900 deducted
- Duty on 2 weekly offs and on Gandhi Jayanti: 3 × ₹450 = ₹1,350 added
- PF set up as 12% of earned base (₹12,600) = ₹1,512
- ESIC 0.75% of ₹13,950 wages = ₹104.63, rounded up to ₹105
7.5 overtime hours were also recorded after late handovers. The overtime amount is left out here so the arithmetic stays easy to follow.
| Sample salary line | ₹ |
|---|---|
| Monthly base salary | 13,500 |
| Less absent deduction (2 days) | −900 |
| Weekly off and holiday duty (3 days) | 1,350 |
| Wages for the month | 13,950 |
| Employee PF | −1,512 |
| Employee ESIC | −105 |
| Net salary | 12,333 |
Compliance note
PF, ESIC and working hours in hospitals
Private hospitals, nursing homes and clinics are generally treated as establishments under PF and ESIC law. EPF becomes mandatory at 20 employees. ESIC applies to notified establishments with 10 or more employees (20 in some states), so check the notification for your state.
ESIC coverage matters most for support staff. Employees earning up to ₹21,000 a month contribute 0.75% and the hospital pays 3.25%. In the example above, the employer share is 3.25% of ₹13,950 = ₹453.38, rounded up to ₹454.
Working hours and overtime rates for hospital staff are set by your state's shops and establishments rules and, since 21 November 2025, the labour codes, whose rules are still being notified. Check the rate that applies to you, and review overtime amounts before approving the month.
What stays with the hospital
- Uploading the ECR file and paying the PF challan on the EPFO portal by the 15th.
- Filing and paying ESIC contributions on the ESIC portal.
- Deciding TDS for doctors on salary. Swastik Payroll records it as a deduction but does not compute income tax.
- Visiting consultants paid a professional fee rather than salary, which are normally handled by accounts.
FAQ
Hospital payroll questions
Can a night shift from 10 PM to 6 AM be treated as one day?
Yes. Mark the shift as overnight. The first punch in the evening and the last punch the next morning then form one attendance record, and overtime is measured from 6 AM.
How is duty on a Sunday or hospital holiday paid?
The day is marked present on weekly off, present on holiday, or both. Full days of such duty are counted in the salary record and paid at the per-day rate (monthly base ÷ 30) on top of the monthly salary.
Can we limit what nursing supervisors and HR users can do?
Yes. Staff users get separate permissions for viewing or managing attendance and for viewing, managing or approving salary. A nursing supervisor can manage attendance without seeing salaries, while only the accounts head approves the month.
Do nurses need to come to the office for their salary slips?
No. Employees sign in from a phone or computer to view and print their own salary slips and see their attendance. There is no separate app to install.
What if a staff member moves from ICU to a ward mid-month?
Assign the new shift with the date it starts. Attendance before that date is read against the old shift and after it against the new one. The employee's department can be updated on the profile.
Related
Attendance Management
Biometric sync, mobile punch, shifts and late rules.
ESI Management
Eligibility, 0.75% / 3.25% contributions, ESIC export.
Payroll Compliance
PF & ESIC figures, portal files, audit trail.
Overtime Calculator
Hourly rate and overtime wages.
Overtime Pay Rules
Rates, limits and worked examples.
ESI Calculation & Eligibility
Coverage, rates and examples.
Bring one month of your ward roster
Share a month of shift timings and biometric punches from one department. We will show how Swastik Payroll reads night duty, holiday duty and overtime from it.