IT giant HCL Tech has announced its plan to change its quarterly variable pay policy to fixed salaries for all employees and roll out salary increments from October, following last year's process.
“We have also taken a decision to move the quarterly variable pay and convert that into fixed pay and merge it with fixed salary for all our employees,” HCL Tech's Chief People Officer Ram Sundararajan said at a press conference following the release of quarterly earnings on Monday.
How does HCL Tech variable pay work?
HCL Tech's variable pay system has two components. The first applies to most project-related employees. It involves variable pay based on project performance metrics, distributed quarterly. According to Sundararajan, the IT firm has combined this portion with fixed pay, so it is now paid as a fixed monthly salary.
“We had the variable pay, which is linked to project-level performance metrics that are distributed on a quarterly basis. That part is what we have merged with the fixed pay, so that it gets paid as fixed pay monthly,” the HR head said.
Sundararajan said the second component of variable pay is the annual performance bonus, which will continue. If we consider linking your pay to performance, the ongoing component is the annual performance bonus, which will continue to be in place.
Who is likely to benefit from the change?
The shift from a quarterly variable pay policy will primarily benefit junior staff, while senior employees continue with their annual performance bonuses, according to the IT major.
When will HCL Tech employees get a salary hike?
The IT major will start rolling out the annual increments from October 2025. The company will follow the same process as last year.
"We have gone ahead and made a decision to roll out the increments, which will be effective from October. We'll follow the same process as we did last year in terms of how we go about running the increment process,” said Ram Sundararajan.
HCL Tech attrition rate
The IT major's voluntary employee attrition rate dropped to 12.6% in September 2025, from 12.9% in September 2024 and 12.8% in June 2025. This indicates a decline in the number of employees leaving the company over the past year, based on a trailing twelve-month (LTM) basis, as per the company’s regulatory filing.
HCL Tech had a total of 226,640 employees as of September 30, 2025, compared to 223,151 at the end of June 2025, reflecting a net addition of 3,489 employees during the quarter. On a year-on-year (YoY) basis, the company added 8,019 employees, up from 218,621 in September 2024.