Why And How Employees Should Merge Their PF Accounts While Changing Jobs

People, who switch jobs more than once, should merge all their Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) accounts from previous employers with the new ones. This has to be done to reduce or avoid taxation on the withdrawal of EPF money as it is ensured that there is no gap in the employee’s years of service. For income tax, the withdrawal from the EPF account is exempted from tax after 5 years of continuous service, which is calculated from the date of joining the EPF scheme to the date of making a withdrawal. If there is a gap before completing 5 years, the EPF becomes taxable.

People can merge their various EPF accounts using the Universal Account Number or UAN. It allows people to link all EPF accounts under a single account. UAN also helps people keep track of the multiple EPF accounts opened by different organisations they have worked for.

EPF members can give their UAN to the new employer for opening an EPF account in the new organisation. Once the new account is opened, the money from the previous employer’s EPF account is transferred to the new one. However, there will be a separate procedure if a new UAN is generated by the new organisation. In that case, people will be required to merge all their UANs into one UAN. If an employee has multiple UANs, the latest one should be linked to the new organisation. The PF balances need to be transferred from the other UANs into a single one.

Here’s how people can merge their EPF accounts online-

UAN number must be activated.

One Member- One EPF Account (Transfer Request) under the online services tab should be selected.

In the 3rd step, the personal details of the employee will be shown. Details of the EPF account with the current employer will also be shown. In this EPF account, the transfer will be done from previous accounts.

To transfer the old/previous account, it should be attested either by the previous employer or the present employer. After this, employees should enter the old member ID, i.e., previous PF account number or previous UAN. Employees should click on Get Details after this step.

After this, employees should click on Get OTP and a one-time password will be sent to their number. OTP should be entered and then submitted.

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