Big companies warn labour laws and reporting rules are raising the cost of doing business
Large businesses are flagging labour rules and reporting requirements as a growing drag on operations, with employers saying unclear labour codes and heavier...
Large businesses are flagging labour rules and reporting requirements as a growing drag on operations, with employers saying unclear labour codes and heavier compliance demands are making it harder to run companies across borders. The concern is no longer abstract. It is showing up in boardrooms, legal departments and audit committees.
In India, where four central labour codes are now formally in force, companies and legal experts say the rollout has left grey areas in definitions, uneven state-level rulemaking and higher transition costs for employers working in more than one jurisdiction. One of the sharpest disputes is over the meaning of “industry” and how far worker protections reach under the new framework.
Labour codes bring fresh uncertainty
Nidhi Minocha, group general counsel at JK Cement Limited, said there is still no clear answer on whether corporate offices fall under the new Code’s definition of “industry”. She said the question matters because offices are often doing administrative work rather than providing services to satisfy “human want”, unlike knowledge-process outsourcing firms, which clearly do provide services.
That distinction is not a footnote. It goes to the heart of what firms must prepare for. If corporate offices are covered, Minocha said, the next question is whether they must also follow standing orders.
The compliance burden is landing at a difficult moment for employers. Rules may be in force, but the map is still being drawn.
Auditors and regulators feel the strain
The same theme is playing out in the United States, where the Big Four accounting firms warned the Securities and Exchange Commission that a plan to let public companies report every six months instead of every quarter could weaken audit oversight and raise the risk of missed errors. Deloitte, PwC, KPMG and EY told the regulator there is no clear framework for what auditors would do beyond mandatory SEC filings.
Under the proposal, companies could still update investors through earnings releases or other communications. But the firms argued that key parts of corporate accounting are built around quarterly reporting, and that changing the timetable could require shifts in US accounting standards.
The concern from auditors was blunt. Investor expectations, they warned, could drift away from what auditors actually check.
Why employers are pushing back
Across jurisdictions, the complaint is similar: rules are changing faster than the practical guidance around them. In India, that means state-level rulemaking has not settled evenly. In the US, it means the SEC proposal may reshape how often auditors are involved in reviewing disclosures, with knock-on effects for reporting discipline.
For large firms, that means more lawyers, more internal checks and more time spent on compliance. More cost. More risk. Fewer clean answers.
That tension comes as workplace expectations shift too. Bupa chief executive Iñaki Ereño recently argued that if workers are fixated on work-life balance, the real problem may be the job itself. His view reflects a growing divide between corporate leaders who prize immersion and employees who want clearer boundaries. In practice, labour rules are now where those worlds collide.
The Big Four put the matter in unusually direct terms. “The gap between investor expectations regarding auditor involvement and the actual procedures performed could widen,” Pricew told the SEC in the filing cited by Bloomberg Tax.
