The Employees Provident Fund has taken several steps to aid PF account holders in recent years — including the introduction of an auto-settlement mode for advance claims in certain cases. Reports suggest that the Centre is also set to increase the auto settlement of PF withdrawals from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 5 lakh. Meanwhile Union Minister Shobha Karandlaje told the Lok Sabha last week that more than 60% of advance claims were now being processed in such a manner.
Sources told ANI on Monday that Sumita Dawra — Secretary in the Ministry of Labour and Employment — had approved the proposal to enhance the limit during a meeting held in Srinagar last week. The revision is expected to enhance the ease of living for crores of members. The recommendation will now go for the approval of the Central Board of Trustees.
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PF withdrawals may soon be made through a Unified Payments Interface or UPI as the EPFO gears up to introduce a new system. Dawra indicated last week that the Ministry had approved the recommendation made by NPCI. Members are likely to become able to withdraw PF through UPI and ATM by the end of May or June this year.
The report also quoted sources to indicate that the validation formalities for withdrawing PF have also been reduced from 27 to 18, and it was decided in the meeting to bring it down to 6. Certain upfront validations have been developed to guide members about the eligibility /admissibility of claims and ensure that members do not file ineligible claims.
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The automatic mode of claim settlement was first introduced in April 2020 for illness or hospital advances. It was later expanded to include claims pertaining to marriage, education and housing — with EPFO increasing the auto settlement of the advanced claim limit from Rs 50,000 to Rs 1 lakh.
EPFO has also introduced auto mode settlement of advance claims for 3 more categories: education, marriage, and housing. Over 99.31% claims are now received in online mode and those auto-mode are processed within three days.
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