EPFO to raise retirement age of organised sector workers

EPFO’s apex decision making body the Central Board of Trustee (CBT) will consider a proposal to raise the retirement age of organised sector workers to 60 years for its pension at a meeting scheduled for Wednesday.

Besides, the CBT in this meeting will also deliberate on a proposal to withdraw two years bonus under the pension scheme provided to subscribers after rendering 20 years of pensionable service.

These proposals are included in the agenda for the CBT meeting scheduled on February 5 to be chaired by Labour Minister Oscar Fernandes.

At present, under the Employees’ Pension Scheme(EPS-95), the subscribers of Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) cease to be a member of the pension scheme and can apply for fixation of his/her pension. Thus, he cannot contribute to the scheme after the age of 58 years.

However, there is no age bar for contributing to the Employees’ Provident Fund Scheme (EFF) 1952 and Employees’ Deposit Linked Insurance (EDLI) Scheme 1976 run by the EPFO, an official said.

The Finance Ministry in its memorandum to Labour Ministry has proposed these amendments in the EPS-95 after giving its concurrence for providing a minimum entitlement of Rs 1,000 minimum monthly pension under the scheme.

The Finance Ministry is of the view that raising the retirement age for this purpose will help subscribers accumulate a bigger corpus while delaying the pay-out by two years.

The proposal, if approved, would immediately benefit 27 lakh pensioners. At present, there are about 44 lakh pensioners. Of this 27 lakh, including 5 lakh widows, get less than Rs 1,000 a month.

The Finance Ministry has already agreed to pay Rs 1,217 crore during 2014-15 for ensuring minimum pension of Rs 1,000 per month under the pension scheme.

During the meeting the, CBT is likely to approve the proposal for amending the the EPS-95, EPF and EDLI scheme to enhance the maximum wage ceiling to Rs 15,000 per month from Rs 6,500 per month.

At present, EPFO does not cover organised workers under its social sector schemes whose basic wages including basic pay and dearness allowance exceed Rs 6,500 at the time of joining of service.

Besides other things, the trustees will also consider the proposal for computing the pensionable salary. It is proposed to calculate pensionable salary on the basis of average of salary last 60 months instead of 12 months presently.

The pensionable salary is used for fixing pension of the EPFO subscribers after attaining the age of 58 years.

Source- Economic times

Digital Signatures Under EPFO.

   The Employees Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has not made it mandatory for all employers with more than 1000 workers to send their digital signatures to the EPFO.

   However, Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) is implementing the facility for online claim settlement in respect of transfer claims. This facility is optional and the claims can either be filed on line or through physical form. The system will be made operative after digital signature of willing employer or his representative is registered with EPFO. Necessary communication to this effect has already been sent to all employers and the process of registration of digital signature has also begun.

Data of Members under Employees’ Provident Fund Organization (EPFO)

   Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has date of birth details for more than 4 crore members out of a total members of 8.87 crore as on 01.08.2013. Web facility has been provided to the Employers to upload the date of birth details of all employees. Further, Field Offices of EPFO have been directed to ask Employers to upload these details.

   Providing Annual Statement of Accounts (Account Slips) to the members of EPF is already in place. Para 73(1) of the EPF Scheme 1952 lays down that a statement of account in respect of each member through his last employer to be sent after the close of each year.

   Besides, the following facilities have also been provided for the PF members to know their PF balance:

Passbook for PF Account Holders.

Press Information Bureau
Government of India

   Passbook for PF Account Holders

   There are no dormant accounts in Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO). However, as per provision of para 72(6) of the Employees’ Provident Funds (EPF) Scheme, 1952, a member’s account under certain condition is classified as Inoperative Account. All such Inoperative Accounts have a definite claimant.

   As per Para 73(1) of the EPF Scheme, 1952, a statement of account to each member through his last employer will be sent after the close of each year, showing opening balance, contribution during the year, interest credited, amount debited and closing balance of the year.

   Following initiatives have been taken by the EPFO to provide details to the PF account holders:-

   1)    Online access has been given to the EPF members to ‘Know their EPF Balance’ through the website of the EPFO at http://epfidia.gov.in

   2)    Facility of e-passbook has been provided to the EPF Members. It is an online version of the employee’s Provident Fund account. Transactions are recorded and can be tracked easily by the members by registering themselves on the website of EPFO.

   However, in the event of change of employment, a new PF number is issued to the employees as on date.

   This information was given by Minister of State for Labour & Employment Shri Kodikunnil Suresh in the Rajya Sabha today in reply to a written question.

Leveraging Aadhaar for improving the services of EPFO — regarding.

Employees' Provident Fund Organisation
Ministry of Labour & Employment, Govt. Of India
Bhavishya Nidhi Bhawan, 14-Bhikaji Cama Place, New Delhi-110066

R-I/UID/2010/37496

date: 06.02.2013

To
All ACCs (Political states),
All RPFC-I (In-charge of Regions),
All RPFC-II (In-charge of SROs)
(Through web circulation)

Subject:- Leveraging Aadhaar for improving the services of EPFO — regarding.

Sir,
     This is in reference to Head Office letter No. RI/UID/2010/30051 dated 21.01.2013 on the subject cited above.

   The issue of expeditious enrolment of the EPF members was discussed with UIDAI Officials. It has emerged that UIDAI through its registrars has been organising enrolment camps in 18 states only. Register General of India (RGI) has been collecting data in respect of the remaining states through National Population Register (NPR). While the data collected by RGI is also being processed for issue of Aadhaar numbers by UIDAI, the methodology used by RG1 for setting up enrolment camps is different i.e. it is being done on the basis of house-to-house data collected by enumerators during Census Operations 2011, unlike UIDAI camps, where any resident, irrespective of the place of residence, can get himself enrolled for Aadhaar number. Thus enrolment may take considerable time.

   In view of the discussions held with UIDAI officials and the time required in the process of obtaining Aadhaar numbers, it may not be possible to obtain Aadhaar number/ Aadhaar Enrolment number by EPF members by 1st March, 2013. Therefore, it has been decided to not to make Aadhaar Number/Enrolment number mandatory for EPF members from 1st March, 2013. However, the field offices would make maximum efforts to obtain the available Aadhaar numbers of the EPF members.

   Further your attention is invited to Head Office letter no. MIS-II/ISO- 9001/2011-12/24686 dated 9th November 2012 on implementation of ISO 9001 Certification for the field offices which is a mandatory success indicator under the Results Framework Document (RFD). The updation of members' master in database is one of the standards required for the purpose. In view of the benefits that would accrue both to the EPF members as Well as EPFO, it has now been decided to collect the core banking account number of all the contributing members as indicated in ECR.

   The Regional offices and Sub-Regional offices should make an all-out effort to collect the core banking account numbers in respect of all the contributing members as indicated in ECR. Compliance of instructions may kindly be ensured in this regard.

Yours faithfully,

sd/-
(Anil Swarup)
Central Provident Fund Commissioner

Source:http://www.epfindia.com/Circulars/Y2012-13/RI_UID_37496.pdf

EPFO E-SEWA PORTAL - Employer Registration FAQ

 1. Why should an employer register his/her establishment on the EPFO Employer portal?
     With effect from 01.04.2012, any remittance to be made by the employer has to be done only after generating challan from the Employer Portal of EPFO. In case of wage month March 2012 onwards, the employer has to upload Electronic Challan cum Return (ECR) in the pre specified format and challan will be populated on the basis of uploaded return. For previous and other dues the challan has to be filled in online to generate and print it for remittance.

 2. What happens if the employer does not register?
   The online generation of challan will not be possible if the employer has not registered his/her establsihment. The employer has to register and create his/her user id & password for accessing the Employer Portal of EPFO.

 3. Once the employer enters his/her establishment id a message is displayed ‘No record found”. What should he/she do?
   Please check whether you have entered the correct code number and extension number, if any and have selected the correct EPFO Office. If correct, then please contact the concerned EPFO Regional/Sub Regional Office.

Investment by EPFO in Equities

   The Employees Provident Fund Organisation is not considering investment in equities as funds earning 12 per cent annually in the National Pension System.

   As on 31.10.2012, the total of Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) corpus invested in private sector is Rs. 26,896.54 Crore including Rs. 4.05 Crore investments in blue chip manufacturing companies.

   Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO)ensure security of the capital contributed by the beneficiaries with risk free, consistent return on the same.

   This information was given by the Minister of State for Labour Shri K.Suresh in reply to a written question in the Rajya Sabha today.