EPFO headquarters: 14 Bhikaji Cama Place, New Delhi.

The Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) is one of two statutory social security organisations within the government of India’s ministry of labour and employment. It is responsible for regulating and managing provident funds in India, together with Employees’ State Insurance. The EPFO manages the required provident fund, the basic pension plan, and the disability/death insurance policy. It also monitors international social security treaties. International employees are covered by EPF plans in countries where bilateral agreements have been reached. Such agreements are in existence as of May 19, 2021.

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The Central Board of Trustees (CBT) is the EPFO’s highest decision-making body. It is a statutory body formed by the Workers’ Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provisions (EPF & MP) Act,1952. The government announced a Universal Account Number for EPFO employees on October 1, 2014, to facilitate Provident Fund number portability. The EPFO headquarters are located at 14 Bhikaji Cama Place, New Delhi.

EPFO: Structure

The EPFO serves as the enforcement body to monitor the administration of the EPF & MP Act and as a service provider to covered beneficiaries across the country. The Central Board of Trustees (CBT) is in charge of enforcing the Act. It comprises a Chairman, a Vice-Chairman, 5 Central Government representatives, 15 State Government representatives, 10 Employees’ representatives, 10 Employers’ representatives with the Central PF Commissioner, and the Member Secretary to the Board. The CBT’s Executive Committee comprises CBT members who help the Central Board carry out its administrative tasks.

The Central Board appoints the organisation’s officers in the Cadre of Commissioners under Section 5D to efficiently administer the Act and Schemes. To that end, the organisation’s commissioners are granted broad powers under the statute, including quasi-judicial authority for assessing financial liability on the employer, searching and seizing records, levying damages, attaching and auctioning a defaulter’s property, prosecuting and arresting and detaining defaulters in civil prison, and so on.

The organisation is organised into zones, each led by an Additional Central Provident Fund Commissioner. There are now 10 Zones in India. Regional Provident Fund Commissioners (RPFC) (Grade I) lead one or more Regional Offices in each state. Regional Offices are subdivided into Sub-Regions, led by Regional Provident Fund Commissioners (Grade II). Assistant Provident Fund Commissioners (APFCs) oversee the implementation of the Act and Schemes. Several district offices have an APFC to carry out the plan and handle complaints.

The EPFO currently employs more than 20,000 people at all levels. The Union Public Service Commission of India recruits 815 Commissioners directly and competitively and by promotion from lesser levels. In addition to advancement from the staff cadre of social security assistants, subordinate officers (Enforcement Officers/Accounts Officers) are hired directly.

Universal Account Number

Employees contributing to an EPF are assigned a 12-digit Universal Account Number (UAN). The EPFO generates a UAN for each PF member. The UAN serves as an umbrella for the many Member IDs assigned to an individual by various institutions and remains the same throughout an employee’s career. That is consistent across occupations. The concept is to associate numerous Member Identification Numbers (Member IDs) assigned to a single member with a UAN. UAN allows a member to see the information of all the Member Identification Numbers (Member IDs) associated with it.

The main advantage of using the UAN is the ease with which several Member IDs of a single employee may be tagged. The UAN facilitates the online and offline transmission and withdrawal of PF claims. These services, such as the Online Passbook, SMS services on each contribution deposit, and online KYC updates, may be supplied based on the UAN, allowing balance transfers from one EPF to another. Members may check their EPF balances and UAN status, get a UAN EPF passbook, examine a provident fund claim, and use a new (2018) UAN portal.

Members who are unable to withdraw PF for whatever reason may do so without the authorisation of their employer. They can submit FORM 19 for EPF and FORM 10C for EPS to the EPF office where their EPF account is stored. EPFO UANs are primarily used to track PF balances and the progress of PF claims.