Retirement fund body EPFO has simplified the process of transferring PF accounts on job change by removing the requirement of approval from an employer in the majority of the cases, an official statement said on Friday. Till now, the transfer of Provident Fund (PF) accumulations involved two Employees' Provident Fund (EPF) offices-- the Source Office, from which the PF amount was transferred, and the Destination Office, where the amount is finally credited, the Ministry of Labour & Employment said.
Ministry of Labour & Employment in a statement said that to ensure ease of living for its members, EPFO during January this year, has greatly simplified the process for transfer of PF account on change of jobs by removing the requirement of approval from employer in majority of the cases.
Till now, the transfer of PF accumulations used to happen with the involvement of two EPF Offices. One, from which the PF accumulation is transferred (Source Office) and two, the EPF Office in which the transfer is actually credited (Destination Office).
"Now, with an aim to further simplify the process, EPFO has removed the requirement of approval of all transfer claims at the Destination Office by launching a Revamped Form 13 software functionality." "Henceforth, once the transfer claim gets approved at the Transferor (Source) Office the previous account will automatically get transferred to the present account of the member at the Transferee (Destination) Office instantly furthering the aim of “Ease of Living” for Members of EPFO."
This revamped functionality also provides the bifurcation of taxable and non-taxable components of PF accumulations to facilitate accurate calculation of TDS on Taxable PF interest. " It is expected to benefit more than 1.25 Crore Members facilitating the transfer of around Rs. 90,000 Crores every year henceforth as the entire transfer process shall be speeded up," the Ministry of Labour & Employment said in a statement.
Bulk generation of UAN by Employers without seeding Aadhaar
With a view to further Ease of Doing Business and to address the grievances being raised w.r.t proper accounting of the Past Accumulations that had been remitted to EPFO by the Exempted PF Trusts consequent to the surrender/cancellation of exemption and also in other cases involving remittance of past period contributions consequent to quasi-judicial/recovery proceedings, it has been decided by EPFO to relax the requirement of Aadhaar for generation of UAN/credit of Past Accumulations for such members. Also, a facility for bulk generation of UANs based on the Member Id & other member information available on record so as to enable prompt crediting of funds in the accounts of such members has been provided.
To that effect a software functionality has already been deployed and made available to the Field Offices in the FO Interface for bulk generation of UANs in the above said cases and also account the Past Accumulations without the requirement of Aadhaar in EPFO Application.
However, as a measure of risk mitigation to protect the PF accumulations, all such UANs would be kept in a frozen state and subsequently made operational only after the seeding of Aadhaar.
All these measures are expected to significantly improve services to members and reduce long standing grievances including further streamlining of validations for auto settlement of eligible claims.
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