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Provident Fund Alert: Provident Fund subscribers, here is an important update for you. Starting from September 1, the EPFO is going to change some rules in the Provident Fund regulation. As per the latest update, from September onwards, your employer will only be able to credit money in your provident fund (PF) account if your UAN (universal account number) is linked to your Aadhaar card. Hence, it is mandatory for you to link your Aadhaar card with the provident fund account to get various benefits of the retirement fund.
To implement the new rule, the Employees’ Provident Fund Organization (EPFO) has revised Section 142 of the Code of Social Security 2020. Hence, if the subscribers want to enjoy the benefits of retirement fund then it is mandatory to link your Aadhaar Card with your PF account.
As per the guidelines from the EPFO, if the Aadhaar and UAN are not linked then, the employers would not be able to deposit the employee’s and employer’s contribution in the fund
Speaking to News 18, Subodh Sadana, Partner, AnantLaw, said that the EPFO has revised the Section 142 of the Code of Social Security 2020 to implement this new rule.
Giving further details, Vaibhav Bhardwaj, Partner, IndusLaw, told news 18 that the Union Ministry of Labour and Employment has brought Section 142 of the Code on Social Security, 2020 into effect from May 03, 2021, whereby an employee or any other beneficiary in order to obtain any benefit under the Social Security Code, is required to establish his/her identity (or the identity of her/his family members or dependents, as the case may be) through Aadhaar number.
Not just the monthly EPF contributions, many other facilities and EPFO services will also be impacted if PF account and Aadhaar card are not linked from September 1. Moreover, your contribution to the pension fund will also be affected.
Subodh Sadana also added that the contributions to the pension fund would also be impacted due to non-linking of Aadhaar. He also added that the employees, the contribution would not be deposited until the linking is done and employees would lose the interest on the said amount.
The EPFO had in June revised the norms for filing Electronic Challan cum Return (ECR). The EPFO had directed that the employers shall be allowed to file the electronic challan-cum-returns only for the UAN Linked with Aadhaar with effect from June 1, 2021. On June 15, 2021, EPFO extended the last date to seed the Aadhaar number with UAN from June 1, 2021 to September 1, 2021, for filing the ECR. Hence, it is mandatory for the employers to seed the Aadhaar number of its employees with UAN by August 31, 2021 while filing ECR.
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