Going a step ahead in this technological revolution, Labour Minister Mansukh Mandaviya has declared that the new IT system ‘EPFO 2. 01’ will be implemented within the next three months. It forms a part of the overhaul of EPFO’s IT architecture that the government is keen on undertaking to increase the operational efficiency in provident fund administration.
Epfo stands for Employee’s Provident Fund Organization, it is one of the largest Social Security organizations in India It has the following features.
The EPFO 2. 01 system is said to transform claims and services offered by the provident fund. Here’s what to expect from this advanced system: Here’s what to expect from this advanced system:
- Centralized Claim Settlement: A centralized facility for claim settlement will be granted through the new platform which will carry through the auto-processing of claims from end to end.
- Universal Account Number (UAN) Integration: EPF accounting shall be basing accounts on the United Application Number, thus account tracking and management would be easy.
- Revised ECR System: The Restructured Electronic Challan-cum-Receipt (ECR) will consist of a statement and detailed remittance Challan.
- Seamless Job Transitions: It means that currently members have to transfer MID and that will be a thing of the past with the integration system in place.
Centralized Monthly Pension Disbursements: Payments of pensions will also be made through the system making it easy to address issues to do with pension disbursements, in terms of reliability and standardization.
Recent Developments
Mandaviya launched the ‘Online Module for Surrender of Exemption’ on 13/08/2024. The new facility in this new exemption surrender also provides for online submission of the surrender application, application validation, and transfer of previous accumulations. It eliminates the odd process of manual filing of documents and helps establishments in monitoring more applications easily.
Anticipated Benefits
The launching of EPFO had a fundamental architecture which was followed by the second generation of EPFO. 01 should also help to drastically cut the time it takes for several key transactions between members and employers. The process of changing and bringing about structural reforms in the centralized payments and claims settlement will be done in a mission mode to ensure that there is minimal disruption in the system.
The following is the way through which the reality of System 2 was realized: The overall government’s goal concerning members and employers is to enhance their quality of life and simplify compliance respectively as embodied by the number 01. In this FY25, EPFO has simplified the IT process for auto-mode processing of EPF advance claims up to rupees one lakh, where around 40% of cases are automatically approved.
Conclusion
The EPFO 2. 01 system is based on changing the current operational approaches for managing the provident fund accounts and claims into more effective methods. This upgrade represents a major advancement in the process of bringing the services of the EPFO in line with the contemporary standards of service delivery to its members/employers.
