Nearly 300 firms may not be paying PF interest
NEWDELHI: Hundreds of thousands of people putting money into the governmentrun Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) every month may not have been earning interest for the last two years.
The government has found that nearly 300 companies that are running their own PF trusts are flouting rules and may have been failing to pay interest.
Data from the labour ministry shows that EPFO was suspicious about the activities of 331 exempted establishments or companies who collect and manage their employees’ provident fund corpus. The EPFO has ordered a departmental enquiry against them.
“(At least) 331 establishments had not reported the interest rate for the financial year 2016-17 and it’s still not clear whether they have declared interest rate for 2017-18 as yet,” said a labour ministry official requesting anonymity.
The EPFO had announced 8.65% interest rate to its subscribers in 2016-17 and 8.55% in 2017-18. All exempt establishments are legally bound to pay the interest rate declared by the EPFO or more than that.
Following a preliminary investigation, it was found that some 57 of the 331 companies have declared and disbursed interest. “EPFO field offices are still investigating the rest,” said a second government official.
Separately, some 10 establishments were found declaring or disbursing interest rates that were less than the statutory rates for 2016-17.