New Delhi: The Employees’ Prpivdent Find Organisation (EPFO), a nodal body that regulates the government’s flagship EPF social security scheme for salaried individuals has made multiple efforts to educate subscribers on the privileges that come with a PF account and how to port them and keep earning interest through a subscriber’s career cycle. However, PM Economic Advisory Council member Sanjeev Sanyal’s recent call to make EPFO faster higher and stronger touched a raw nerve and led to a spontaneous overflow of grievances from PF subscribers on social media.
What PMEAC member said
In an article in the Economic Times, Sanyal jointly wrote with PMEAC professional Shrishti Chauhan that “the EPFi system is very inefficient.” He said the digitalisation of EPFO has helped to highlight the true magnitude of issues with the system since 28 per cent of all withdrawal claims had been rejected by the EPFO in FY23. Pension withdrawals and insurance claims rejections stood at a whopping 44 per cent and 39 per cent, respectively, they said.
As of FY24, the EPFO had Rs 8.505 crore lying in inoperative accounts and Rs 58,000 crore unclaimed PF deposits in 2022. Sanyal and Chauhan also pointed out the EPFO website’s unfriendly user interface and the pension fund regulator’s outdated servers being inadequate to handle the weight of interlinking 123 regional databases.
Social media users share their EPFO stories
Social media platform X user Jagdish Joshi said “EPFO is a scheme to loot salaried class,” adding that there was a high chance that withdrawal claims may be rejected without any reason until the subscriber gives up.
To be sure, another user named Ashoka said that after 6 months of going around in circles, an official at the EPFO office in Bengaluru led them to meet the PF commissioner directly, providing them immediate relief with respect to linking of previous and current employer’s PF accounts.
Another user who goes by the handle, @askmeaboutlinux, said there is no pan-India service to offer linkage of PF account hed with employers across different cities. X user VetriValan said EPFO is “the most inefficient govt outfit.” Prabhat Chaturvedi, another X user, said he thought EPFO officials had intentionally designed “outdated and frustrating systems.”
X user Rudranarayan Sahoo said that even though he had entered all his information correctly, the EPFO system had prevented him from withdrawing his money. Another X user, Sanjay Saini pointed out that his employer’s mistake in filing the details with EPFO had resulted in his money being stuck for years.
EPFO is a huge huge pain. My money stuck for years.. mistakes of employers in filling details and the employee sufffers. no one listens.
— sanjay saini (@sanjaysaini1) August 7, 2024
X user Fringe Element said they were saddled with two UANs despite his Aadhaar being linked. They said their UAN merger request remained unanswered.
I have 2 UAN numbers active. When UAN is linked to Aadhar, how can they have 2 active for the same person? I have put a merger request but there’s no update. Ideally they should automatically detect such issues & resolve them proactively.
— Fringe Element (@OfficeOfSA) August 7, 2024
Some X users also called for moving EPF to NPS, which they said offered a smoother user experience and transparency of services.
How to file EPFO-related grievances?
X user Hasit Seth wrote that the Prime Minister’s Office was monitoring PF-related complaints. Another social media user I Joshi suggested reaching out to EPF i Greivance Management System (EPFIGMS) before filing a complaint on the Centralised Public Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) the grievance redressal system most likely to be personally monitored by the PMO.
PF subscribers can file their grievances at — https://epfigms.gov.in/Grievance/GrievanceMaster
EPFO subscribers took to social media to air their grievances with respect to the pension behemoth’s dated systems and poor grievance redressal mechanism. Here’s why Personal Finance Business News – Personal Finance News, Share Market News, BSE/NSE News, Stock Exchange News Today
