EPFO members alert! Provident Fund regulator issues new guidelines to change name, DoB, other PF account details

EPFO Members Alert! The Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has issued new guidelines for changing one's Provident Fund (PF) account details like correction in name, father's or husband's name, date of birth, etc. In the new guidelines, EPFO members need to classify their PF account correction in minor and major and on the basis of that process to make PF account correction will have to be carried out.

Reason for new guidelines for EPFO members
The EPFO made it clear that the reason for issuing new guidelines has been taken to contain fraudulent activities like PF withdrawal from one's PF account by complete name and profile change. According to the EPFO new guidelines, corrections in EPFO member’s profile have been allowed to rectify the errors in name, father or husband’s name, date of birth and gender.

Now, in new EPFO guidelines for PF account correction, a complete change in the member profile cannot be allowed in the normal course through online or offline process except in extreme situations where it has been proven that the member name has been changed following the due process prescribed in law, or there has been an erroneous upload of member data by the employer, on production of documentary evidence by the member and employer and after due verification.

WATCH | Click on Zee Business Live TV Streaming Below:

Here is the EPFO guideline for online KYC correction:

For Minor EPFO KYC correction

1] If the correction is related to expanding the name or surname from abbreviation to full name, or vice versa, without changing the first letter if, after the correction, the pronunciation of the name doesn’t change. For e.g. from A. Kumar to Ashok Kumar, from A. K. Verma to Anil Kumar Verma is a minor correction. But from A. Kumar to Dinesh Kumar is not a minor correction.

2] If the father name or husband name is inserted as a middle name in AADHAAR e.g. Mrunalini Kumar (s/o or w/o Ashok Kumar) to Mrunalini Ashok Kumar.

3] If it involves only changing the surname of female employees after marriage. E.g. from Mrunalini Kumar to Mrunalini Singh.

Major PF account corrections

All those cases, which do not fall in the category of “Minor correction”, or any correction leading to complete change in name/father name, or where correction in more than two fields are involved.

For information to the EPFO members, major PF account corrections as described above shall not be done in the online process without obtaining proper documentary proof, including an explanation from the employer, and verification of the genuineness of the case.