Why this is not a monthly-salary PF/ESI calculator
Most PF and ESI calculators online — the ones built for HR and office payroll — start from a fixed monthly CTC: a set salary, split into basic, HRA and allowances, the same every month regardless of how many days fall in it. That model does not describe a construction site. A site labourer is on a muster roll: paid a daily rate for the days actually attended, which changes every wage period — 21 days one fortnight, 26 the next, 23.5 when a half-day is marked.
So this calculator is built the way site wages are built. You enter a daily wage and payable days — not a monthly salary — and the days can be fractional, because attendance on a muster roll genuinely is. Basic earned is simply the daily wage times the days worked; everything statutory is layered on that. It is the same arithmetic a site supervisor does by hand on the wage sheet, not the CTC-decomposition an office payroll tool performs.
What the two wage ceilings protect against
PF and ESI each carry a statutory wage ceiling, and the two ceilings do opposite jobs — which is exactly why a daily-wage tool has to handle them separately.
The ₹15,000 EPF ceiling caps the deduction. Employee PF is 12% of basic earned, but only up to a basic of ₹15,000 — so the deduction is capped at ₹1,800 (12% × ₹15,000). This protects the worker’s take-home: a good stretch of days at a healthy daily rate can push basic earned well past ₹15,000, yet PF never bites more than ₹1,800. Without the cap, a busy month would quietly eat a larger and larger slice of the wage. In Test Case 1 below, basic earned is ₹20,700 and 12% of that would be ₹2,484 — but the cap holds the PF at ₹1,800.
The ₹21,000 ESI ceiling caps the coverage. ESI is a health-insurance scheme for lower-wage workers; once a worker’s gross wages cross ₹21,000 in the period, they fall outside ESI and no employee ESI is deducted at all. This protects against a wrong deduction: deducting ESI from a worker who is above the ceiling takes money that should never have been taken. So the tool applies 0.75% only while gross is at or below ₹21,000, and drops it to zero above — flagging the change so it is never silent.
Worked example — Test Case 1
Take a worker on ₹900 a day who is marked present for 23 days, with no overtime and no advance to recover — the values the calculator loads with.
Basic earned = ₹900 × 23 = ₹20,700.00
Gross wages = ₹20,700.00
− PF (12%, capped) = ₹1,800.00
− ESI (0.75%) = ₹155.25
− Advance = ₹0.00
─────────────────────
Net payable = ₹18,744.75
Basic earned is ₹20,700, which is also the gross since there is no overtime. PF would have been ₹2,484 at a flat 12%, but the ₹15,000 ceiling caps it at ₹1,800. Gross is under ₹21,000, so ESI applies at 0.75% = ₹155.25. Nothing to recover, so the worker is paid ₹18,744.75. Change the daily wage, days, overtime or advance above and every line — and the net payable — updates live. (For a second check, a worker on ₹650 for 20.5 days nets ₹11,626.06: basic ₹13,325, PF ₹1,599 — below the cap — and ESI ₹99.94.)
For estimation and cross-checking reference only. This computes the employee-side deductions (12% PF capped at ₹1,800; 0.75% ESI up to the ₹21,000 gross ceiling) and the net payable on one muster-roll wage; the employer’s own PF and ESI contribution is separate. Exact applicability — coverage thresholds, contribution rates, overtime rules and advance recovery terms — depends on the establishment, the state and the current statute. Not legal or payroll advice; verify against the applicable rules and a qualified professional before disbursing wages.