In an effort to provide relief to Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) subscribers and restore confidence in the retirement fund body, the central government is actively addressing its technical issues, with expectations that more than half of these problems will be resolved within this year.
Union Minister of Labour and Employment Mansukh Mandaviya on Tuesday told reporters that the government recognises the outdated nature of the EPFO’s information technology (IT) infrastructure and emphasised the need for its enhancement. “It is true that the EPFO’s IT system is old, which is why we want to introduce EPFO 3.0. About 25 per cent of the issues have already been resolved in the last couple of months, and we expect to address around 30 per cent more in the coming months,” the minister said.
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In July, the Employees' Provident Fund Officers’ Association (EPFOA) in a letter requested the Labour Minister’s intervention to enhance EPFO’s IT infrastructure, citing daily system deficiencies. The association highlighted a decline in the application’s performance, resulting in frequent slowdowns, involuntary user logouts, and complete system failures.
It flagged the urgent need for a comprehensive overhaul of the EPFO application software, a necessity that was evident for quite some time. Despite this critical requirement, the implementation of such an overhaul has been repeatedly delayed for reasons that remain unclear, the body noted, while adding that they have been raising this issue over the past 30 months.
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According to Mandaviya, while briefing on the work done by the Modi 3.0 government in its first 100 days, strengthening the EPFO system has been a priority since the conclusion of the elections. This is because the system not only serves millions of workers across the country but also acts as a platform for the government to track job creation.
Labour Secretary Sumita Dawra, in a recent interview with Outlook Business, noted that the EPFO also functions as a feedback mechanism for employment-related schemes and policies. Due to this, it will be helpful in tracking the progress of the employment-linked incentive (ELI) schemes announced in the Union Budget 2024-25. The ministry is about to send a cabinet note in the coming weeks to seek approval for these schemes.
Before addressing the technical concerns of the EPFO system, the minister also announced an increase in the withdrawal limit for subscribers. They can now withdraw up to Rs 1 lakh at once, up from the previous limit of Rs 50,000. This adjustment is made as the older cap had become outdated in light of changing consumption expenditures.
