Most people spend their last few days at a company focused on the handover and the farewell. The paperwork is something that most Indian employees don’t take seriously. Then, six months later, a background check happens, or after 3–4 years, your new company demands papers of every company you have worked with.
Your HRMS portal access goes away on your last day. Your company email disappears shortly after. Everything behind those logins goes with it. Collect these before you leave, not after.
- Resignation Acceptance Email
The most overlooked document on this list. You wrote the resignation letter but what you actually need is the reply from HR or your manager confirming it, with a date stamp.
This email is proof that your notice period started on a specific date. In BGV disputes and notice period disagreements, the company’s records can differ from yours. Without a timestamped acceptance, you’re arguing from memory. Forward it to your personal email before your access is revoked.
- Relieving Letter
This is the single most important document for your next job. Background verification teams in India ask for it by name. It confirms that you left the company properly, notice served, dues cleared, handover done.
Some companies delay it. If they do, follow up in writing with a deadline. Indian courts have consistently held that withholding a relieving letter without cause is not legally defensible. A formal email citing this usually moves things. Don’t chase it on WhatsApp email only, so there’s a record.
- Experience Letter
Different from the relieving letter, though many people use the terms interchangeably. The experience letter confirms your designation, dates of employment, and nature of work. It’s a factual record of where you worked and in what capacity.
This one is your legal right as an employee company cannot withhold it. If your relieving letter is delayed for some reason, the experience letter plus payslips and bank credits will cover most BGV requirements. Get both.
- Last 12 Months’ Payslips
Download all of them before your last day. Not three months. Twelve, minimum and ideally everything going back to when you joined.
Home loans ask for 6 months. Visa applications sometimes ask for 3 years. New employers doing salary verification may want to see your last few payslips to confirm what you actually earned. Once the HRMS access goes, getting old payslips requires emailing HR and hoping someone responds which gets harder the longer you wait.
- Form 16 / Form 130 (TDS Certificate)
Form 16 is the TDS certificate your employer issues every June for the previous financial year. It shows your income and the tax deducted on your behalf.
Without it, your income tax filing becomes a manual process cross-referencing 26AS and trying to reconstruct figures that should be on one page. If you’re leaving mid-year, the partial-year Form 130 (the new name from FY2026-27) comes out the following June. Set a reminder for it it won’t come to you automatically after you’ve left.
- Full and Final Settlement Statement
The F&F statement is the document that shows the complete calculation of your final payout last month’s salary, earned leave encashment, notice period deductions if any, reimbursements, bonus if applicable. It’s the paper trail for what you received and why.
Under the new Labour Code being implemented across states in 2026, F&F must be processed within two working days of your last day. If your company takes longer, follow up in writing with that timeline cited. Keep the final statement disputes about F&F calculations are common, and this document is how you prove what was agreed.
- PF Passbook and UAN Number
Your UAN (Universal Account Number) stays with you across every job. The PF money accumulated at your current company gets transferred to your new company’s PF account using this number.
Before you leave: log into the EPFO member portal and verify that your name, date of birth, and Aadhaar are correctly linked. A mismatch even one letter in your name blocks PF transfers and can take months to fix after exit. Download your PF passbook as well. It shows every month’s contribution and is useful if there’s ever a shortfall dispute.
| If you have PF accounts from previous companies still sitting untransferred: Consolidate them before leaving. Transfer previous employer PF to your current UAN now, while your current employer’s HR can assist if anything goes wrong. Once you’ve left, corrections and transfers become your problem alone. |
- Gratuity Settlement Letter (if 5+ years)
If you’ve completed 5 or more years, you’re entitled to gratuity. Formula: (last basic salary × 15 days × years of service) ÷ 26. The company must pay it within 30 days of your last working day.
Get the calculation in writing specifically which salary figure they used (must be last drawn basic) and confirmation of the payment date. If you were on a fixed-term contract, note that under the Industrial Relations Code 2020, fixed-term employees are now entitled to proportionate gratuity after just 1 year not 5. Many companies still don’t know this.
- No-Dues Certificate
A sign-off from every department IT, admin, finance, library, whatever your company requires confirming you’ve returned assets and cleared outstanding dues. Many companies won’t issue the relieving letter until this is complete.
Start this process in the first week of your notice period, not the last day. IT takes time to deregister your laptop. Finance needs time to process pending reimbursements. Leaving the no-dues run until the end delays everything else.
- ESIC IP Number (if applicable)
If your gross salary was ₹21,000/month or below and you were covered under ESI, your IP (Insured Person) number with ESIC matters after you leave. ESI medical benefits continue for 6 months after your last working day provided you contributed for at least 78 days in the preceding 6-month period. Most people don’t claim this and let it lapse without knowing it existed.
Get the IP number from HR before you leave. If you need medical treatment in the months after your exit, this covers you.
- Offer Letter and Increment Letters
Your original offer letter has your joining salary, role, and notice period clause all of which can matter in disputes years later. Increment letters show your salary progression and are sometimes asked for during loan applications or salary negotiations at the next company.
These are in the HRMS or your company email both disappearing on exit. Download or forward them now.
- NDA and Service Bond Copy
Re-read it before you leave. Specifically: how long does any non-compete clause run? Which industries or geographies does it cover? Is there a non-solicitation clause around clients or colleagues?
Indian courts have started enforcing reasonable post-employment restrictions more seriously. If your next role is with a competitor or in the same domain, and you don’t know what you signed, you’re taking on a legal risk you haven’t quantified. Not reading the NDA is not a defence.
If the Company Withholds Something
It happens. Here’s what to do, in order:
Email first formally, with a deadline. ‘Please provide my relieving letter by [date]. I’m available for any pending formalities.’ Most delays are just an admin backlog.
Build the substitute package. Appointment letter + 6 months payslips + bank salary credits + Form 130 + EPFO passbook covers most BGV requirements even without a relieving letter. Tell your new HR proactively.
Labour department complaint. Experience letters and earned salary are legal entitlements. A complaint to the Assistant Labour Commissioner gets attention from companies that ignore emails.
Legal notice. A lawyer’s notice usually ₹5,000–10,000 often gets documents issued within days from companies that had been stalling for weeks.
Two hours on your last day downloading what’s in the portal, forwarding key emails to personal email, verifying PF details handles all of this. It rarely feels urgent until it is. Do it before you leave.
A Small Note For The Employers: – If you’re an employer reading this, the biggest reason exit documents get delayed is that HR data is scattered across different systems. Attendance, leave, payroll, and employee records are all managed separately, so HR ends up chasing files and sending multiple follow-up emails. Waggex brings everything into one place, so when an employee’s last working day arrives, all the required documents are ready to issue. Employees leave with the paperwork they need, and your HR team can focus on the handover not the paperwork.