India's largest software services firm Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) on September 2 said there are no changes in its increment policy for employees, and all experienced hires will get an annual salary appraisal, Livemint.com reported.

The company said, "We have always had increments in line with industry benchmarks. Even during the pandemic, we ensured our increment cycles were unaffected. It is incorrect to suggest otherwise. All experienced hires will be given an increase as part of the annual salary appraisal that follows their one-year anniversary."

The statement came on the back of reports that e-mails were sent to staff that it won’t be rolling out hikes to employees who have completed one year with the tech firm, Livemint.com said.

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"There has been a recent revision in TCS policy around the first anniversary," said a letter sent to the employees. The letter states that those who have completed their first year on April 1 or thereafter will not receive a letter and/or increment on completion of one year.

"The first increment will be at the subsequent annual increment cycle," said the letter. The changes in policy come at a time when the tech sector is gearing up for budget constraints against a recession in the US.

Recently, there were reports that TCS deferring quarterly payouts and bonuses by a month to August, which employees usually receive as part of their July salary. However, TCS denied it, saying the variable is paid in month one or two as per the normal process.

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Meanwhile, Infosys has scaled back its average variable payout to employees to about 70 percent for the June quarter amid a margin squeeze and high employee costs.

Recently, Wipro held back the variable pay of employees mainly due to pressure on margins, inefficiency in its talent supply chain and investment in technology.

Managers at the C-suite level of the company will not get any portion of variable pay, while employee grades between freshers to team leaders will get 70 percent of the total variable pay, sources aware of the matter had earlier said.

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(Edited by : Shoma Bhattacharjee)