To enhance the ease of living for its crores of members, the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has introduced auto-mode settlement of advance claims for education, marriage and housing.
The retirement fund body has announced the extension of the auto claim solution for all claims under para 68K by including education & marriage purposes — and 68B — housing purposes — of EPF Scheme, 1952.
EPFO auto claim settlement
The EPFO has introduced an auto-claim solution wherein claims are processed automatically by IT system without any human intervention.
In addition, it stated that the limit has been doubled from earlier Rs 50,000 to Rs 1,00,000. This move is expected to benefit lakhs of EPFO members.
The expansion of the scope of the auto claims to housing, marriage and education purposes as well as enhancement will directly help many members to avail their funds within the shortest possible duration, which will substantially aid them in promptly meeting their education, marriage, or housing requirements.
Claim settlement
EPFO has settled 4.45 crore claims during 2023-24, with 2.84 crore of these being advance claims (for withdrawal of funds).
According to a statement, during the financial year 2023-24, the EPFO settled around 4.45 crore claims, of which more than 60 per cent (2.84 crore) claims were advance claims (for withdrawal of funds on grounds like illness, marriage, education).
Of total advance claims settled during the year, about 89.52 lakh claims were settled using auto-mode.
The entire process in auto-settlement is IT system-driven, eliminating human intervention.
As a result, the periodicity of claim settlement is reduced significantly from 10 days to 3-4 days for such advances.
The claims that are not validated by the system are not returned or rejected. They are further undertaken for a second level of scrutiny and approvals.
Introduced on May 6, 2024 across the country and since then the EPFO has approved 13,011 cases for Rs 45.95 crore vide this initiative providing speedy service.
The auto mode of claim settlement was introduced in April 2020 to assist people in advance claims for illness. The limit for this claim has been enhanced to Rs 1,00,000.
During the current year, around 2.25 crore members are expected to reap the benefits of this facility.
Citing an example, the labour ministry stated that Anirudh Prasad had applied for advance for illness under para 68J (of the scheme) on May 9, 2024 and his advance claim was settled on May 11, 2024 for Rs 92,143 within three days.
There are many such stories like that of Anirudh Prasad in EPFO, it claimed.
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