-The Hon’ble Supreme Court, vide its judgment dated 04-11-2022, had afforded further time and a window of opportunity for exercising options. Jointly, by the eligible employees and their employers, to be able to avail pensions on wages beyond the ceiling limit of Rs. 15000. That is on wages on which one paid contributions to Employees Pension Scheme 1995 (EPS). This was only in respect of those who continued to be in service after 1 Sept., 2014.
As a result, the Chandigarh Regional Office of EPFO had received applications from 24,250 EPS members. Of these, 19,367 were on the format of Joint Options, in respect of those who had continued to be in service after 1 Sept., 2014. These were amongst the highest in the country. Keeping in mind the numbers, the volume of records to be examined, and the reasoned decision to be taken, the Regional Office Chandigarh worked in a mission mode beyond office hours and on Saturdays/holidays as an extraordinary call of duty. Having put most of its staff and officers on the task for the last fortnight of Financial Year 2024-25, 14,158 of such Joint Option applicants were decided eligible for pension on higher wages in light of the Hon’ble SC Judgment. Demand letters to such employees, after calculating the lump sum arrears’ contributions along with the interest component, were sent by 31 March 2025, affording time up to 3 months to remit such contributions. The demand letters issued were more than 73% of the joint option applications received, the highest in the country in percentage terms and 3rd highest in absolute number terms.
A lot of such members have now deposited the amounts against the demand letters. The regional office is once again on full steam mode to be able to finalize pension payment orders (PPOs) and arrear payments to all such pensioners by 30 June 2025. Since a lot of such members are visiting the regional office to make inquiries, the regional PF commissioner, Chandigarh, Dr. Kishan Pratap Singh, has requested the EPS members concerned to kindly wait until the first week of July 2025 so as to let the staff and officers focus on the task for the sake of everybody in the spirit of first in, first out.
Dr. Singh further emphasized that the Regional PF Office, Chandigarh, has registered an outstanding performance during the financial year 2024-25, achieving significant milestones across multiple service delivery parameters. In the area of claims settlement, RO Chandigarh has settled 697,372 claims in FY 2024-25, as compared to 506,325 claims during FY 2023-24, reflecting a robust year-on-year growth of 37.73%. This commendable increase in productivity has been matched with a notable improvement in service delivery timelines, as 91.55% of claims were settled within 10 days in 2024-25, as opposed to just 77.72% in 2023-24. Further, 99.41% of claims were settled within 20 days in 2024-25, up from 96.86% in 2023-24. The return/rejection rate too was down to 20.18%, down from 27.22% the previous year. Similarly, with faster and more accurate settlements and lower rejections, the volume of grievances has significantly declined. The total number of grievances received during FY 2024-25 stood at 14,797, down from 16,835 in FY 2023-24. Notably, grievances per lakh claim settlements were reduced from 3,325 in FY 2023-24 to 2,139 in FY 2024-25, marking a 35.6% reduction in the number of grievances per lakh claims received.
Dr. KP Singh further underscored that with the bulk of pensions on higher wages being a one-time activity being taken care of, the EPF subscribers can look forward to even further reduction of hassle and turnaround for service delivery and grievance redressal. The ease in claims processing, grievance reduction, and pension implementation reaffirms EPFO’s dedication to the timely delivery of services and ease of doing business for the employers.
