sumHR Alternative for Indian Businesses: HR and Payroll on the Same Record as the Rest of the Company
For HR heads and owners of growing Indian companies: keep attendance, leave and payroll working as they do today, and connect them to accounts, projects and operations.
Teams that search for a sumHR alternative are usually not unhappy with their HR tool. sumHR is an Indian HR and payroll product built for small and mid-sized companies, and it covers the everyday work of attendance, leave and salary well for many of them.
The question tends to come later, when salary costs must reach the books by cost centre, when a project manager wants timesheets against budgets, or when a new joiner needs a laptop, a customer login and a training plan on the same day. Each of those lives in a different system.
This page covers where that split costs time, an illustrative example, how Apragya handles HR and payroll as part of one platform, and who should stay where they are.
Where a standalone HR tool starts to cost
Payroll posted by hand
Salary journals are exported, reworked and keyed into accounts each month.
Two employee lists
Operations, projects and IT keep their own copy of who works here.
Timesheets without budgets
Hours are logged, but nobody sees them against project cost.
Audit questions
Who changed a salary, and when, is spread across tools.
An example: a Coimbatore textile exporter
Take an illustrative 240-person exporter with two units and a head office. Attendance comes from biometric devices, payroll runs monthly with PF, ESI and PT, and accounts rebuild the salary entry from a spreadsheet every month.
One payroll month, from punch to books
Biometric punches
eSSL devices at both units feed attendance.
Leave and shifts
Approved leave and shift changes applied.
Payroll run
Earnings, PF, ESI, PT and TDS worked out.
Anomaly check
An agent flags unusual changes for review.
Salary in the books
Cost posted by unit and department.
In the first month on one record, accounts stopped rebuilding the salary journal. The review step caught a contractor added twice at the second unit, and the cost by unit was in the books the day payroll closed.
How Apragya works as an HRMS software India teams can grow into
Step 1 of 5
Employee record
One employee, with documents, bank details, skills and history.
- Employee record: One employee, with documents, bank details, skills and history.
- Attendance: Biometric punches from eSSL devices, shifts, overtime and regularisation.
- Leave: Leave types, policies, quotas and encashment set by your HR team.
- Payroll: Salary structures, PF, ESI, PT, LWF, TDS, loans and full and final.
- Beyond HR: The same employee appears in projects, expenses, IT assets and approvals.
Choosing HR and payroll software for small business growth
If HR is the only thing you need, a focused HR tool can be the right answer. If people costs have to reach accounts, projects and approvals, a shared record removes the monthly rework. Compare the two on the tasks you repeat every month, not on feature lists.
sumHR and Apragya, side by side
| Feature | sumHR | Apragya |
|---|---|---|
| Core focus | HR and payroll for SMEs | HR and payroll inside a wider platform |
| Statutory payroll | Check the vendor's current features | PF, ESI, PT, LWF and TDS |
| Salary into accounts | Through export or integration | Posted to the same books |
| Employee record | Within the HR product | Shared with projects, expenses and assets |
| AI on the record | Check the vendor's roadmap | Agents with human review |
Checked against public information on 16 September 2026.
What sets Apragya apart
One record
HR, payroll, accounts and operations read the same employee.
Agents that check
Payroll and leave agents flag what a person should look at.
Access by role
Salary data is visible only to the roles you choose.
PII masking
Sensitive fields are masked, and access is logged.
Phone-friendly web app
Employees apply for leave and see payslips on their phone.
Published plans
Plans and limits are on the pricing page, not in a quote.
See the detail for attendance, leave and payroll software for India.
How to move from sumHR
- Export employees, salary structures and leave balances from your current tool.
- Import them into Apragya before the start of a payroll month.
- Connect the biometric devices and check a week of attendance.
- Run one month of payroll in parallel and compare every payslip.
- Switch over at the next month start, and post salary to the books.
A parallel month is the safest check, because every difference shows up on a named payslip.
What it costs to start
Moving from sumHR, answered
Who should stay with sumHR?
Can we keep our biometric devices?
Will year-to-date payroll figures come across?
Do we have to move accounts at the same time?
What does it cost to start?
Run one payroll month on one record
Import your employees, connect attendance and compare a parallel payroll before you switch.