|
To expand the 'Ease of Living' of its 7.5 crore members, Employees Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has decided to enhance the auto settlement of advanced claim (ASAC) limit by five times from currently Rs 1 lakh, sources told ANI.
According to sources, Sumita Dawra, Secretary, Ministry of Labour and Employment had approved the proposal to enhance the limit from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 5 lakh in the 113th meeting of Executive Committee (EC) of Central Board of Trustees (CBT), held last week. This revision will enhance the ease of living for its crores of members. The meeting was held in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir on March 28, which was attended by Ramesh Krishnamurthi, Central Provident Fund Commissioner, EPFO. Now, the recommendation will go for the approval of CBT. After the approval of CBT, EPFO members can withdraw PF up to Rs 5 lakh through ASAC. The auto mode of claim settlement was introduced in April 2020 for advance for illness. In May 2024, the EPFO increased 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. Earlier, members were able to withdraw their PF for only illness/hospitalisation purposes. The auto-mode claims are processed within three days, with 95 percent of claims now being automated. The EPFO achieved a historic high of 2.16 crore auto-claims settlement as of March 6, 2025, during the current financial year, up from 89.52 lakh in 2023-24. According to sources, the rejection of claims ratio has also been reduced to 30 per cent, from 50 per cent last year. The EPFO has introduced an auto-claim solution in which claims are processed automatically by an IT system without any human intervention. According to sources, 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. The claim settlement process is being further simplified with the centralization of member databases under Centralized IT Enabled. The entire auto-settlement process is IT system-driven, eliminating human intervention. Any claim with KYC, eligibility, and bank validation are processed for payment automatically by IT tools. As a result of this, the periodicity of claim settlement is reduced significantly from 10 days to within 3-4 days for such advances. Claims that are not validated by systems are not returned or rejected. They are further undertaken for a second level of scrutiny and approval. In a groundbreaking development for India's workforce, the EPFO is set to introduce a revolutionary new system for PF withdrawals through Unified Payments Interface (UPI). Last week, Labour and Employment Secretary Sumita Dawra said that the ministry has approved NPCI's recommendation, and members may withdraw PF through UPI and ATM by the end of May or June this year. This may also be a good pilot to members of others schemes like General Provident Fund (GPF) of Govt Employees of Public Provident Fund (PPF) of Banks. (ANI)
|
