MACP benchmark

The MACP benchmark is Very Good for all posts from 25 July 2016, an overall APAR grade of 6 to short of 8. How the screening committee applies it and defers.

Updated 8 September 2026

The MACP benchmark is Very Good, for all the posts, for every financial upgradation under the Modified Assured Career Progression scheme falling due on or after 25 July 2016. That single sentence is the whole rule. It is paragraph 17 of the Scheme annexed to Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2008-Estt.(D) dated 19 May 2009, as substituted by Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2015-Estt.(D) dated 28 September 2016, and it replaced a benchmark that had been Good for most employees.

Very Good is not defined anywhere in the MACP orders. It is a band on the appraisal scale, and it means an overall APAR grade of 6 to short of 8 on the ten-point scale under Annexure I to Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2005-Estt.(A)(Pt-II) dated 23 July 2009. An employee whose reports in the reckoning period do not reach it does not lose the upgradation. It is deferred, and under paragraph 15 of the consolidated guidelines the later upgradations shift back by the same delay.

The benchmark is where most MACP disputes actually start, because it converts a scheme that looks automatic into one that turns on appraisal grades written years earlier by a reporting officer who was not thinking about MACP at all.

The benchmark is Very Good for all the posts

Paragraph 5 of Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2015-Estt.(D) dated 28 September 2016 substituted paragraph 17 of the MACP Scheme to read:

For grant of financial upgradation under the MACPS, the prescribed benchmark would be ‘Very Good’ for all the posts.

Twenty-one words, and no qualification. The words “for all the posts” are the operative change, because the benchmark they replaced was not uniform. Under the 2009 Scheme the bar was Good up to the grade pay of Rs. 6,600 in pay band 3, and Very Good only for a financial upgradation to the grade pay of Rs. 7,600 and above. The 2016 substitution pulled every post up to the higher figure.

Paragraph 6 of the same Office Memorandum fixes the commencement at 25 July 2016, the date of the resolution notified by the Department of Expenditure accepting the recommendations of the 7th Central Pay Commission. That date matters more than it looks. It is not 1 January 2016, from which the pay matrix and the revised pay itself took effect, so an upgradation that fell due between 1 January and 24 July 2016 is governed by the old split benchmark even though the employee was already drawing revised pay.

The Office Memorandum carries a small oddity on its face. The date is typed as September 27, 2016 and corrected in manuscript to 28, which is why departments cite it variously as 27.09.2016, 28.09.2016 or, as the Government of Puducherry did in its Office Memorandum No. A.32019/1/2009/DPAR/CCD(2) dated 6 November 2017, “27/28.09.2016”. The signed date is 28 September 2016. Paragraph 3 of the same document also misprints the founding 2009 Office Memorandum number as 35024/3/2008-Estt.D, though paragraph 1 gives it correctly as 35034/3/2008-Estt.(D).

What Very Good means on the APAR scale

Very Good means an overall grade of 6 to short of 8. The four bands come from Annexure I to Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2005-Estt.(A)(Pt-II) dated 23 July 2009, which governs the annual performance appraisal report rather than MACP:

Overall grade	Band
8 to 10	Outstanding
6 to short of 8	Very Good
4 to short of 6	Good
Below 4	Unnamed

The overall grade is not a number the reporting officer writes down directly. Annexure I builds it from three blocks of the report: the mean of the work output entries multiplied by 0.4, the mean of the personal attributes entries multiplied by 0.3, and the mean of the functional competency entries multiplied by 0.3, the three products added together. An officer graded 8 throughout work output but 7 throughout the other two blocks reaches 7.4, which is Very Good and not Outstanding.

The arithmetic is worth following, because the MACP bar sits at exactly 6.00. A report that averages 5.9 is Good and fails the benchmark; one that averages 6.0 clears it. The gap between the two is a single point on a single parameter in one of the three blocks.

Which appraisal years the higher benchmark reaches

Paragraph 17(i) of Annexure-I to the consolidated guidelines of 22 October 2019 states that the revised benchmark “shall be applicable for the APARs for the year 2016-17 and subsequent years”. Paragraph 17(ii) then says that the benchmark for 2015-16 and earlier years continues as it was under the Office Memorandum of 19 May 2009, and reproduces the old rule verbatim before setting out this table:

APAR for the year	Benchmark, Level 11 and below	Benchmark, Level 12 and above
2013-14 and earlier years	Good	Very Good
2014-15	Good	Very Good
2015-16	Good	Very Good
2016-17	Very Good	Very Good
2017-18 and subsequent years	Very Good	Very Good

The table is the operative instrument in almost every real case, because a MACP considered in, say, 2019 reads reports written on both sides of the 2016 line. An employee at Level 11 or below is judged against Good for the older reports and Very Good for the newer ones, so two pre-2016 reports graded Good do not sink the case.

An employee at Level 12 or above gets no such transition. Level 12 corresponds to the pre-revised grade pay of Rs. 7,600, which is precisely the figure at which the 2009 Scheme already demanded Very Good. For that officer the 2016 substitution changed nothing at all: the bar was Very Good in 2013-14 and it is Very Good now.

Who applies the benchmark, and when

A screening committee applies it, constituted in each department under paragraph 4 of Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2015-Estt.(D) dated 22 October 2019. The composition is fixed: a chairperson and two members, the members holding posts at least one level above the level in which the MACP is being considered and in no case below the rank of Under Secretary or equivalent, with the chairperson generally a level above the members.

The committee is not a departmental promotion committee and the consolidated guidelines nowhere equate the two. Its recommendations are approved by the Secretary of the ministry where the appointing authority is the President and the committee sits in the secretariat, by the head of the organisation where the committee sits in a field, attached or subordinate office, and by the appointing authority in every other case, under paragraph 5.

Timing is fixed too. Paragraph 6 requires the committee to meet twice in a financial year: the meeting in the first week of January takes the cases maturing between April and September, and the meeting in the first week of July takes those maturing between October and March. An employee completing 10 years of service in November is therefore considered in the July meeting that preceded it, not after the event.

The reckoning period, and what the guidelines leave open

Paragraph 17(ii) says the departmental screening committee “shall assess the APARs in the reckoning period”. It does not define the reckoning period, does not fix a number of years, and does not prescribe how several reports are to be combined into one verdict.

That silence is the source of most of the disagreement about how many Very Good reports an employee needs. The table in paragraph 17(ii) attaches a benchmark to each report year rather than to a count of years or to an average across them, which reads naturally as a year-by-year test. Where scores are averaged instead, Annexure I to the Office Memorandum of 23 July 2009 supplies the values used for the purpose: 9 for Outstanding, 7 for Very Good, 5 for Good and zero for any grade below 4. Averaging those numbers over five reports produces a different answer from applying the benchmark report by report, and the consolidated guidelines do not say which method binds.

Departments have filled the gap in different ways, which is why an employee refused an upgradation in one ministry may see a colleague in another cleared on the same spread of grades.

What happens when the benchmark is not met

The upgradation is deferred. Paragraph 15 of Annexure-I to the guidelines of 22 October 2019 addresses a financial upgradation deferred and not allowed after 10 years in a level because the employee is unfit or because of departmental proceedings, and provides that this has a consequential effect on the subsequent financial upgradation, which is deferred to the extent of the delay in the grant of the first one.

The mechanism is a shift, not a restart. An employee whose first upgradation is held up by 26 months takes the second and third upgradations 26 months late as well, rather than waiting a fresh 10 years from the deferred grant. The distinction is worth money: on a Level 6 to Level 7 movement the difference between the two readings runs to years of the higher annual increment base.

The cost does not stop at retirement either. Paragraph 21 makes the pay drawn in the level granted under MACP the basis for determining terminal benefits, so a deferral that is never made good compresses pension and gratuity as well as pay.

Relaxation, and challenging a grading

The Scheme has no relaxation clause. Paragraph 17(i) prescribes Very Good for all levels in flat terms, and neither the substituting Office Memorandum of 28 September 2016 nor the consolidation of 22 October 2019 gives a screening committee, an appointing authority or an administrative ministry any power to grant an upgradation to an employee whose reports fall short.

The route to change the underlying grade is the appraisal process, and it closes early. Paragraph 2(ii) of Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2005-Estt.(A)(Pt-II) dated 14 May 2009 requires the full report to be communicated to the officer reported upon, including the overall grade and the assessment of integrity, and allows a representation within 15 days, to be disposed of within 30 days. Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2010-Estt.A dated 13 April 2010 requires that disposal to be quasi-judicial, with reasons recorded for any upgradation of a grade.

An employee who lets that window pass has no second one. The screening committee reading a Good grading for 2017-18 in a meeting held in 2023 is reading a grading that became final in 2019, and it has no jurisdiction to reopen it.

The benchmark does not govern promotion

This is the most common error on the subject. Paragraph 5.1.45 of the 7th Central Pay Commission report recommended that the “benchmark for performance appraisal for promotion and financial upgradation under MACPS be enhanced from ‘Good’ to ‘Very Good’”, covering both, and paragraph 5 of the Office Memorandum of 28 September 2016 records that the government considered that recommendation and accepted it.

What the Office Memorandum then did is narrower than what it accepted. Its operative words substitute paragraph 17 of the MACP Scheme, and they touch nothing else. No corresponding amendment was made to the instructions a departmental promotion committee works under, so the benchmarks there remain those of Office Memorandum No. 35034/7/97-Estt.(D) dated 8 February 2002: Very Good for promotion to Pay Level 12 and above, and Good for grades below Pay Level 12, including promotion from a lower group into a Group A post. For promotion to Pay Level 14 and above, Office Memorandum No. 22011/3/2007-Estt.(D) dated 18 February 2008 requires Very Good in each of the five reports under consideration rather than in the round.

The practical consequence is a gap that surprises people: an employee at Level 8 can be found fit for regular promotion on a Good record and refused a MACP upgradation on the same record in the same year. The wider comparison is set out at MACP compared with promotion.

Railway staff, autonomous bodies and disciplinary cases

Railway employees are covered through the Railway Board rather than directly. The Board circulated the revised benchmark as RBE No. 155/2016 and the consolidated Scheme as RBE No. 16/2020, and zonal railways have reissued the year-by-year table to their own staff, as East Coast Railway did for non-gazetted employees by letter No. ECoR/Pers/R/Clari-MACPs/2020 dated 29 July 2020.

Autonomous bodies are not covered automatically. Paragraph 14 of Annexure-I makes the Scheme directly applicable only to Central Government civilian employees, and permits extension to employees of central autonomous or statutory bodies under a ministry subject to the conditions in Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2010-Estt.(D) dated 3 August 2010. A body that has not adopted the Scheme has no MACP benchmark to apply.

Where disciplinary proceedings are running, paragraph 18 puts the case under the rules governing normal promotion, which means the CCS (CCA) Rules, 1965 and the sealed-cover instructions issued under them, rather than under the benchmark rule. Paragraph 19 keeps the Scheme uniform for Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe employees, confines reservation in promotion to the regular promotion stage, and makes it non-mandatory to associate SC and ST members in the screening committee.

Who the Scheme covers at all

The benchmark only bites on employees the Scheme reaches. Paragraph 3 of the Office Memorandum of 22 October 2019 applies it to all regularly appointed Group A, B and C Central Government civilian employees, except officers of the Organised Group A Services, and excludes casual employees, employees granted temporary status, and those appointed on an ad hoc or contract basis. Paragraph 3 of Annexure-I caps the upgradations at Level 15, the Higher Administrative Grade.

The Scheme itself has been in force since 1 September 2008, and paragraph 8 of the 2019 Office Memorandum reserves any interpretation of its scope and meaning to the Establishment (D) division of the Department of Personnel and Training.

In force today

The benchmark for a financial upgradation under the MACP scheme is Very Good for all the posts, under paragraph 17 of the Scheme as substituted by DoPT Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2015-Estt.(D) dated 28 September 2016, effective for upgradations falling due on or after 25 July 2016. Very Good means an overall APAR grade of 6 to short of 8 under Annexure I to Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2005-Estt.(A)(Pt-II) dated 23 July 2009. The higher benchmark applies to the appraisal reports for 2016-17 and subsequent years; for 2015-16 and earlier the 2009 benchmark continues, which the table in paragraph 17(ii) of Annexure-I to the consolidated guidelines of 22 October 2019 renders as Good for Level 11 and below and Very Good for Level 12 and above. A screening committee of a chairperson and two members applies it, meeting twice a financial year. If the benchmark is not met the upgradation is deferred, and the later upgradations shift back by the same delay under paragraph 15. There is no relaxation clause, and an APAR grading not contested within 15 days of communication cannot be reopened at the screening committee stage. The change did not alter the departmental promotion committee benchmarks of 8 February 2002.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

What is the benchmark for MACP?

The benchmark is Very Good for all the posts. Paragraph 17 of the MACP Scheme, as substituted by Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2015-Estt.(D) dated 28 September 2016, reads: “For grant of financial upgradation under the MACPS, the prescribed benchmark would be ‘Very Good’ for all the posts.” It applies to every upgradation falling due on or after 25 July 2016, and it replaced a split benchmark under which Good was enough up to grade pay Rs. 6,600 in pay band 3.

What APAR score is Very Good for MACP?

An overall grade of 6 to short of 8 on the ten-point scale. The MACP orders do not define Very Good themselves; the word takes its meaning from Annexure I to Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2005-Estt.(A)(Pt-II) dated 23 July 2009, which sets four bands: 8 to 10 Outstanding, 6 to short of 8 Very Good, 4 to short of 6 Good, and anything below 4 unnamed. The overall grade is built as 40% of the work output block, 30% of personal attributes and 30% of functional competency.

From when does the Very Good benchmark apply to MACP?

From 25 July 2016. Paragraph 6 of the Office Memorandum of 28 September 2016 fixes that date because it is the date of the resolution notified by the Department of Expenditure accepting the 7th Central Pay Commission recommendations, not the 1 January 2016 pay date. Two separate tests follow from it: the upgradation must fall due on or after 25 July 2016, and the higher benchmark then bites on the appraisal reports for 2016-17 and subsequent years.

Which APAR years carry the Very Good benchmark?

The reports for 2016-17 and subsequent years. Paragraph 17(ii) of Annexure-I to the consolidated guidelines of 22 October 2019 states that the benchmark for the years 2015-16 and earlier continues to be as it was under the Office Memorandum of 19 May 2009, and reproduces that older rule verbatim: Good up to the grade pay of Rs. 6,600 in pay band 3, and Very Good for financial upgradation to the grade pay of Rs. 7,600 and above.

What is the MACP benchmark for Level 12 and above?

Very Good in every reckoned year, including years before 2016. The table in paragraph 17(ii) of Annexure-I to the guidelines of 22 October 2019 sets Very Good against Level 12 and above for 2013-14 and earlier, 2014-15, 2015-16, 2016-17 and later years alike. Level 12 corresponds to the old grade pay of Rs. 7,600, which already carried a Very Good bar under the 2009 Scheme, so the 2016 change gave officers at that level and above nothing they did not already face.

What happens if the MACP benchmark is not met?

The upgradation is deferred, not cancelled. Paragraph 15 of Annexure-I to the guidelines of 22 October 2019 covers a financial upgradation deferred and not allowed after 10 years in a level because the employee is unfit or because of departmental proceedings, and provides that the subsequent upgradation is deferred to the extent of the delay in the grant of the first one. The employee is reconsidered when the appraisal reports in the reckoning period reach the benchmark.

Does a deferred MACP delay the second and third upgradations?

Yes, by the same period. Paragraph 15 of Annexure-I to the guidelines of 22 October 2019 shifts the subsequent upgradation by the extent of the delay in the first, so the 20-year and 30-year stages move back by exactly as long as the 10-year stage was held up. The shift is not a fresh 10-year clock started from the date of the deferred grant, and it carries through to the pay drawn at retirement, which paragraph 21 makes the basis for terminal benefits.

Can the MACP benchmark be relaxed?

The Scheme contains no provision for relaxing it. Paragraph 17(i) of Annexure-I to the guidelines of 22 October 2019 prescribes Very Good for all levels without any escape clause, and neither the Office Memorandum of 28 September 2016 nor the consolidation of 22 October 2019 empowers a screening committee, an appointing authority or a ministry to grant an upgradation below the benchmark.

Can an APAR grading be challenged when MACP is refused?

The route runs through the appraisal process, not the screening committee. Paragraph 2(ii) of Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2005-Estt.(A)(Pt-II) dated 14 May 2009 requires the full report, including the overall grade, to be communicated to the officer reported upon, who may represent within 15 days, with the representation to be disposed of within 30 days. Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2010-Estt.A dated 13 April 2010 requires that disposal to be quasi-judicial and reasoned. A grading not contested in that window stands when the screening committee reads it years later.

How many Very Good gradings are needed for MACP?

The guidelines fix no number. Paragraph 17(ii) of Annexure-I to the Office Memorandum of 22 October 2019 says only that the departmental screening committee assesses the appraisal reports in the reckoning period, and the table then attaches a benchmark to each report year rather than to a count of years or to an average. Annexure I to the Office Memorandum of 23 July 2009 supplies the arithmetic used where scores are averaged, assigning 9 to Outstanding, 7 to Very Good, 5 to Good and zero to a grade below 4.

Does the MACP benchmark apply to promotion by a DPC?

No. The 7th Central Pay Commission recommended in paragraph 5.1.45 that the benchmark be raised for promotion and for financial upgradation alike, and paragraph 5 of the Office Memorandum of 28 September 2016 records that the government accepted it, but the operative part of that Office Memorandum substitutes paragraph 17 of the MACP Scheme and nothing else. The benchmarks for a departmental promotion committee still come from Office Memorandum No. 35034/7/97-Estt.(D) dated 8 February 2002: Very Good for promotion to Pay Level 12 and above, and Good below that.

Does the Very Good benchmark apply to railway employees?

Yes, through the Railway Board. The Board circulated the benchmark as RBE No. 155/2016 and the consolidated MACP Scheme as RBE No. 16/2020, and zonal railways have issued the same year-by-year table to their non-gazetted staff, as East Coast Railway did by letter No. ECoR/Pers/R/Clari-MACPs/2020 dated 29 July 2020.

Does the benchmark apply in an autonomous body?

Only if the body has adopted the Scheme. Paragraph 14 of Annexure-I to the guidelines of 22 October 2019 makes the MACP Scheme directly applicable to Central Government civilian employees alone, and allows extension to employees of central autonomous or statutory bodies under a ministry subject to the conditions in Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2010-Estt.(D) dated 3 August 2010. Where the body has adopted it, the Very Good benchmark comes with it.

Is the benchmark relaxed for SC and ST employees?

No. Paragraph 19 of Annexure-I to the guidelines of 22 October 2019 extends the benefits of the Scheme uniformly to all eligible Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe employees, keeps the rules of reservation in promotion for the regular promotion stage only, and provides that it is not mandatory to associate SC and ST members in the screening committee that considers financial upgradation.

External references

References

Modified Assured Career Progression Scheme, Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2008-Estt.(D) dated 19 May 2009, whose paragraph 17 prescribed the benchmark of Good up to the grade pay of Rs. 6,600 in pay band 3 and Very Good for financial upgradation to the grade pay of Rs. 7,600 and above.
Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2015-Estt.(D) dated 28 September 2016, paragraph 5 substituting paragraph 17 of the Scheme to read “For grant of financial upgradation under the MACPS, the prescribed benchmark would be ‘Very Good’ for all the posts”, and paragraph 6 fixing the commencement at 25 July 2016, the date of the Department of Expenditure resolution accepting the 7th Central Pay Commission recommendations.
Consolidated guidelines regarding the Modified Assured Career Progression Scheme for the Central Government Civilian Employees, Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 35034/3/2015-Estt.(D) dated 22 October 2019: paragraphs 3 to 6 on coverage, the screening committee, the approving authority and the twice-yearly meeting calendar, and paragraphs 3, 14, 15, 17(i), 17(ii), 18, 19 and 21 of Annexure-I.
Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2005-Estt.(A)(Pt-II) dated 23 July 2009, Annexure I, prescribing the grading bands of 8 to 10 Outstanding, 6 to short of 8 Very Good, 4 to short of 6 Good and below 4 unnamed, and the computation of the overall grade at 40% work output, 30% personal attributes and 30% functional competency.
Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2005-Estt.(A)(Pt-II) dated 14 May 2009, paragraph 2(ii), on communication of the full appraisal report and the 15-day representation window, read with Office Memorandum No. 21011/1/2010-Estt.A dated 13 April 2010 on quasi-judicial disposal of a representation.
Seventh Central Pay Commission report, paragraph 5.1.44 on continuation of the Scheme at 10, 20 and 30 years, and paragraph 5.1.45 recommending that the benchmark for performance appraisal for promotion and financial upgradation under MACPS be enhanced from Good to Very Good, both quoted in the Office Memorandum of 28 September 2016.
Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. 35034/7/97-Estt.(D) dated 8 February 2002, prescribing the departmental promotion committee benchmarks of Very Good for Pay Level 12 and above and Good below it, and Office Memorandum No. 22011/3/2007-Estt.(D) dated 18 February 2008 on Pay Level 14 and above.
Government of Puducherry, Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms, Office Memorandum No. A.32019/1/2009/DPAR/CCD(2) dated 6 November 2017, communicating the DoPT clarification that where a MACP falls due on or after 25 July 2016 the overall grading of the appraisal reports must be at least Very Good.
Railway Board RBE No. 155/2016 and RBE No. 16/2020, and East Coast Railway letter No. ECoR/Pers/R/Clari-MACPs/2020 dated 29 July 2020 applying the benchmark table to non-gazetted railway staff.