The Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has brought a major relief for its crores of members. The process of transferring your Provident Fund (PF) account when you change jobs has now been made extremely simple. EPFO has launched a revised Form 13 software for this purpose. With this significant change, in most cases, you will no longer need approval from the employer for PF account transfer.
The Ministry of Labour & Employment shared information about this new initiative, stating that until now, the transfer of PF amount involved two different EPFO offices – one from where the money is coming and the other where it is to be deposited.
To simplify this process, EPFO has now introduced a revised Form 13 software. In this new system, the requirement for approval of transfer claims from the PF office where the account is being transferred to has been removed. This means that as soon as the transfer is approved by your previous PF office, your past PF account balance will automatically transfer to your current Provident Fund account.
EPFO has also ensured that along with the account transfer, a detailed breakdown of the total amount deposited in PF, specifying the tax-free and non-taxable portions, will also be sent. This will enable the correct calculation of TDS (Tax Deducted at Source) on the taxable PF interest of the employee.
According to the Ministry of Labour, this change will directly benefit more than 1.25 crore members of EPFO. Every year, an amount of approximately ₹90,000 crore is transferred between EPF accounts, and with this new system, the process will become significantly faster than before.
Speeding up UAN Generation
To ensure that funds are deposited quickly into EPFO members’ accounts, a facility has also been started for generating UAN (Universal Account Number) based on member ID and other available member information. A software functionality has been provided to the field offices for this, which will enable the bulk generation of UANs in such cases, even if Aadhar is not immediately available in the application.
However, to ensure the security of the PF fund, all such UANs will remain in an “inactive state” and the previous balance will be visible in them, but they will only become “active” after Aadhar linkage. The Ministry believes that these steps will improve EPFO services and are expected to reduce complaints related to long-pending settlement claims.
How to Check Your PF Balance:
You can easily check your PF balance in two ways:
1. Via Missed Call: Give a missed call from your registered mobile number to 9966044425. The call will automatically disconnect, and shortly after, you will receive a message containing your PF balance and other details.
2. Via SMS: You can also check your balance by sending an SMS to 7738299899. The SMS format is: EPFOHO UAN <language code>. For example, if you want information in Hindi, send: EPFOHO UAN HIN. This facility is available in approximately 12 languages.
