Why you should NOT celebrate the International Women’s Day with a cooking competition at the Workplace

The International Women’s Day is around the corner, i.e. on March 8, 2020. That being a Sunday, most organisations have decided to celebrate it on the Mon, Mar 9. It’s usual for every HR team to make a plan and celebrate the day certain set of programs and competitions within the office. We do, too, at FullContact. This post is not to talk about what we do, but what one should do.

(Image courtesy: http://www.durocherflorist.com)

How to?

I have seen many messages by HRs asking for ‘what do you do for women’s day’; so that we can replicate questions. Well, sometimes discussions like these are about sharing ideas, but many a time, they end up being a means to do something on the Women’s Day as an engagement activity (oh boy, a term that has lost its charm!).

Let’s think for a moment. Why do we need to celebrate Women’s Day? Is there a problem that we are trying to address at our organisation? It could be an equality issue. It could be an inclusion concern. It could be a facilities concern that male employees have access to but not women for their gender. Do you have such an issue at the organisation that’s unfair to your women employees? That’s what you should discuss and target to resolve.

Who to?

Usually, HR department takes care of conducting the engagement activity on the Women’s Day. Most organisations have an HRBP structure these days and why don’t we do it not on our shoulder but as a collaborative activity? First and foremost, stop planning the day with the help of male employees alone. They might be missing much of the context as to why we should ‘celebrate’ a day for women employees—why don’t you call in volunteers from among your women workforce to plan, better, a women’s day? They know their problems at the workplace!

What to

What to do on a Women’s Day will vary from organisation to organisation. As I said earlier, your intention should be to celebrate the successes of women, being an inspiration to women in the organisation, AND to try and resolve concerns your women employees have in terms of equality and inclusion.

Events such as cooking competition, best saree wearing competition, etc. are, in my personal opinion, are regressive in nature. A patriarchal society like ours has celebrated such forcefully collocated chores and events to women. As progressive organisations, our intention should not to celebrate and promulgate such practises but to address the issues that are created by such implicit biases.

HRs, think about what you want to do at your organisations. I am sure you will find something better than a cooking competition!

Still, give me some ideas!

I’ll begin with a few from the list of events that our team discussed Women’s Day Week #SheIsUs at FullContact this time (fully planned and owned by our non-HR members):

An AMA session where any questions about inclusion, equality at the workplace is answered and acted upon.
Select documentaries on inspirational figures from among women leaders around the world.
Inspirational Women stories from among our own members.
As part of #FullContactThanks, a day dedicated to thinking about and acknowledging one woman in our members’ lives.
Inspirational women leaders having a conversational meeting with the whole of the office where we will try to address some implicit bias issues.
Sponsor a girl child program with equal contributions from the organisation and the members.
Motivation to go out and be outdoorsy to those who didn’t get a chance to do so—clubbed with #HealthyFullContact.

Second Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Also published on LinkedIn and Medium.

Did your employer ever deny the Experience Certificate? Read on.

Indian labour laws are, majorly, employee-centric than employer-centric. Though this is the state of the act, most employees are not aware of their rights per various labour laws of the land. Or else, many employers purposefully do not educate their employees of the latter’s rights at the workplace.

One of the major threats many young professionals face from disgruntled employers is ‘we will not issue the experience certificate unless you do x or y‘. Not issuing an experience certificate is, unfortunately, used by many HRs and management as a tool to get something done by the employee. This something could be repayment of what the employee owes to the company, the employee not serving the notice period, etc.

Another common practice among some SMEs (I must admit that this trend is on a decline now) is to keep the originals of the employee’s certificates and mark lists with them until the term of employment/resignation. This is to make sure that the employee does not look for alternative employment whilst employed at the master organisation. Poor employee, s/he believes that the organisation has rights in their limit to do so and obeys this demand.

As it turns out (and it has always been like that), NO EMPLOYER is entitled to DENY experience certificates (service certificate in legal terms) to an employee or a former employee. If the employee demands such an experience certificate during or after the term of employment, the organisation is BOUND to issue one. To cite the labour law, 2J(3) of Kerala Shops and Commercial Establishments Act, 1961 mandates that the employer shall issue the service certificate in Form BE, within seven days from the receipt of such a request from the employee (every state has its own S&CE Act, and they will have similar provisions).

In a nutshell, employer cannot deny a service certficate (experience certficate) even if the employee is absconding or under a formal domestic enquiry for a gross misconduct. If the employer does not follow the request, the employee has the right to contact the District Labour Officer or the Labour Court thereafter for redressal.

Now, Section 5E of the aforementioned act says:

5E. Prohibition of retaining education certificate or experience certificate.—No educational certificate or experience certificate in original received from an employee shall be retained by the employer of any establishment at the time of appointment or during the course of employment.

This means, no establishment has the right to retain the originals of the experience certificate and/or educational certificates of their employees. Copies, however, can be maintained for record purposes, but originals have to be returned immediately after verification.

Ever denied justice? Talk to your HR first. If they do not fall in line, you now know what to do.

Also published at LinkedIn and medium.

Musings of an Engineer-turned-HR: Here’s what the budding HRs should know

It was on a not-so-fine day that Arjun, CEO of Profoundis and my collegemate met me at Lulu Mall in Kochi. I was going back to Bangalore, where I worked at Oracle as a Software Engineer for around 3 years then, and I had no clue what Arjun had to offer. He asked me if I would like to join as the Head of HR of Profoundis, which was about to be acquired by FullContact, Inc.

I personally believed that I had the traits of an HR (though when I look back now, most of those thoughts were out of place ;-)). I had a dilemma during the final year of study of my graduation whether I should pursue MBA or MTech. After a lot of articulation and inner discourse I decided to pursue MTech, which I do NOT regret now. I ended up in IT, as I assumed, but I never felt Software Engineering was my realm. Having these excruciating thoughts to jump out of my engineer role coupled with Arjun’s offer, I didn’t have a second thought. I had my personal reasons to move to Kochi, too.

If I do not say that I was apprehensive, rather confused, about my capacity to be a Head of HR at the very beginning of my HR career itself, I wouldn’t be doing justice to me. I did a lot of reading afterwards, which in fact Arjun asked me not to. He said they wanted an unconventional HR, who doesn’t go by the books, and recommended that I be not distracted and misinformed by the literature. However, I did my fair share of reading before I joined Profoundis.

What followed was a roller-coaster ride. As I write this, I can feel the cold feet I’d when I first entered the Profoundis office. But I’d something in store – an amazing team who believed that people operations is fundamental and pivotal to any business. There started this small journey of my HR career, which is now at the fourth year! The three years have been of immense learning, understanding, mistakes, corrections, unlearning and what not! I would like to scribble down for the budding HR fellows, who might have as bad a cold feet as I’d on my first day, as to what to expect, what to ignore, what to render on an HR job. Here we go:

Prepare to Unlearn and Re-learn

One might have learnt many things about HR and processes in their text book; or they might have been told that this is how the ideal HR function looks like. Be ready to face the fact that HR is different across organisations depending on the nature of business, nature of the workforce, locale and the priorities of the leadership. What you learnt in books could be obsolete by when you join the HR job – so be ready to remember/forget what you learnt and start afresh on many things—let’s preserve and remember what’s still required. Be ready to read and re-read the latest books, trends, researches, blogs, etc. so that you stay up-to-date.

HR is not just about compliance

The general notion that many have is that HR is all about recruitment and compliance – this is a myth. HR has over the last two decades evolved as a business function. While compliance plays an important role in the success of an HR team, treating them as the core function of HR is erroneous. Compliance is an assumed-to-be-required function of HR. It’s very basic. HR’s more to it. But remember—compliance is a culture. Nurture it, but that’s not only what you’re defined by.

Culture is your dad, business is your mom

It’s the business leadership and the HR leadership together that decide the fate of an organisation. If one of this duo fails, either you will end up with a zero or negative business growth or a bunch of unsatisfactory people. The two are complementary to each other—or, rather, co-existent. HRs (should get a chance to) decide the culture of an organisation, while they participate in deciding the business destiny. Gone are those days when HRs come into play when someone needs to be hired, reprimanded or fired. Starting from talent acquisition to talent development to talent retention to talent nurturing to making the workplace a great experience for your members depend on how the HR team is envisaged and functions. Your job exists because the business exists

Find your path to heaven

One may define the success of their career by multi-factors. For some, it could be the happiness of their members, achieving KRIs, promotions and merit increases, and what not! But ultimately, if you ask me, the end result of one’s actions should be such that it makes him/her happy.

Learning is the Key

You need to invest some time to learn. To learn from others, your peers, leaders, fellow HRs, blogs, and what not! Make sure you are part of the communities of your liking. I have learnt a lot from the fellow HRs through NIPM, WhatsApp groups, meetups at Infopark, conferences, etc. Whenever you’re part of such a gathering, make sure you find (rather than it giving you; thanks to Anish for the usage) some takeaway as learning. You may also follow some really good HR blogs like PeopleMatters, RBL, etc.

Learn from marketers

It’s high time HR team learnt from the Marketing teams on various fronts. Starting from employer branding, HR should look at how the marketing team hustles in getting the product into the market and reach the right targets. In my opinion, Marketing teams are the ones who first use all the theories and tools of human interactions, technology, and result-oriented-action-plans in any organisation. They are leaders in many respect – for example, take the case of Conjoint analysis which helps the product organisations decide how their product should be. HRs can very well adopt this (and many organisations have already done so) technique to define the happiness factors of their members—the benefits, the facilities, the factors by which they will leave the organisation, etc. One must look at how the marketing team performs in their organisation and imbibe what can be imbibed into their HR team—be it theories of human interaction or defining success of one’s function.

Not every grey hair deserves your ears

Keep the thought that every grey-haired man is a mentor out of your minds; it’s the grey matter that matters. You might need a mentor who can lead you through your HR career—since you’re just taking your baby steps—but that doesn’t mean that you should lend ears and years to those who pretend to be mentors. Try a few, leave them it doesn’t work. But trust me, having a good mentor is always worth the effort—but the call is yours.

Do not forget to live

When you strive to have a great work-life balance for your members, do not forget to have a life for yourself. Chill, keep calm and just be yourself. Have an introspection of whether you hate Mondays, or super happy on Fridays—if the answer is a yes, you should consider switching the job. At the end of your life, what matters is whether you have been happy throughout and that happiness is defined by you and you alone.

Also published at https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/musings-engineer-turned-hr-heres-what-budding-hrs-t-a-shrm-cp/?published=t

Training Your Employees to Take up Jobs at Other Companies? Yes, Amazon does it!

The Last Mile has always been a concern for all the realms of ideas. Today, let’s have a look at one of the Last Mile (at least, I would prefer calling it so) stretch of an HR concept.

Many organisations see training as an investment with a target ROI to the business. While this is an agreeable concept, IMHO, training is an ‘engagement’ (may not be in its traditional meaning) activity. When an organisation trains an individual, s/he is seen as an asset and thus feels more valued in the organisation. Plus, training offers avenues for self-exploration and self-improvement. Training, if done at the right metrics, certainly can improve the engagement dynamics.

Amazon went to that extra mile when it comes to learning. They are now offering company-sponsored learning budget to employees to TAKE UP JOBS IN OTHER COMPANIES. Yes, you heard that right!

Amazon found that there is a chunk of their employees who are earning less than the average of salaries. Those employees may leave the organisation owing to this concern. Most organisations would let it go—which is the start of that ‘extra mile’—as such. Amazon decided to let the employees take up a course of their choice that would equip themselves with skills that will land them in a better job—at the cost of Amazon!

The idea behind this is pure love; to let the employees empower themselves who will later be implicit ambassadors of Amazon. Or at the least, that’s the ‘human’ part of HR 🙂

#humanresources #LnD #training #employeeengagement

The Agony and Ecstasy of Working as HR Professionals in Organisations Today

‘You should not stop being people’s advocate! The day you end being one is the day the HR dies’.

These words which I happened to randomly listen to while working at Oracle as an Engineer, later became the cornerstone of my HR career. While I believe that any job has its own merits and fashions, there are certain jobs that have the capability to make impacts of higher gravities. HR is one, nevertheless, it goes a thankless job in some organisations.

HR, like any other job, is like a two-sided coin. You will have happy days; and then there will be days that give you a headache. Interestingly, the primitives on which the functions of an HR are based invariably embrace the ‘headaches’. What’s fun if things go as in the books; HRs come into play when things are not in line or if there’s no line at all. Thus, the headaches become opportunities. We cannot really see these as binaries—either yes or no—but grey. Let’s have a closer look:

Leaders with People Mindset

HR team’s vision will only be successful when your company has a management that believes in people. Forget your company’s revenue, business strategy and everything else; it’s the faith of the management in the people business and their mindset of treating people as the largest investment that drives the success of any HR team.

Starting from the CEO, every C-level and VPs should have a clear understanding and buy-in to the policies that the HR team parks on. This is the biggest factor of all which decide if an HR’s life is hell or heaven. This article on HBR says that during 2008 recession, only a third of HR departments were consulted when layoffs happened, pointing to lesser influence HRs had in strategic business/people decisions—this is fast changing now.

It’s imperative for the modern day HR to work closely with the line managers as well, to make sure that the ‘people mindset’ envisaged at the top level trickled down appropriately at the length and breadth of the organisation. The organisation’s profitability comes only through the growth; and growth comes only through its employees and culture—not the C-officers alone! HR is certainly a partner in strategy execution, and hence they should have business acumen and understanding as well as the people mindset. 33% of execs believe that there’s ineffective HR leadership that drives their organisation to the unsolicited directions as per this HBR report. This can be tricky and painful for some of us, but definitely the need of the hour; it has always been, but clearer in the recent years.

Data and Opportunities for Analytics

With the advance of technology, data has come to play a major role for the HR as well. This has helped establish data-driven strategies. Since most HR operations have gone digital, HR gets instant access to the data and can run an analysis on it to reach faster and effective conclusions. Analytics has resulted in the greater impact of HR activities starting with talent acquisition through engagement to exit.

Changing Workforce

Gen X is fast coming to the top of the ladders, and most ‘workforce’ now comprises of Gen Y and Z. The millennials tend to pose and trigger a change in the way most HR teams function. The factors that excited Gen X may no longer be valid/needed for the Gen Y/Z. This needs a larger discussion in all organisations, where HR takes the lead role.

Starting from how your recruit talent to keeping them engaged should change due to this workforce change. Your ‘food coupons’ or ‘telephone reimbursement’ may not be an attractive benefit as it used to be. Your vacation plans, office timings, attire requirements and health initiatives may need a thorough change keeping in mind the interest of the new workforce. This is one place where HR gets into agonies or ecstasies. This also points to changing your HR practices and policies to accommodate the new-styled workforce who love things to happen faster and easier.

Pay Gaps and Diversity

Gone are those days HR recruited the ‘protagonists’ alone. Ideologies and societal factors keep changing, and Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) has become another opportunity for HR. While this is seen as an ecstasy from a philosophical standpoint, various reports suggest that the pay gaps and men:women employee ratios are still really bad in numbers. The report from WeForum suggests that in 82 out of 142 countries, pay gaps based on gender is still increasing. This is alarming, and agonising for the HRs, for they have been trying to establish a reverse scenario through D&I and localisation initiatives.

KPMG reports that HRs around the world struggle to keep in line with the global workforce, which turns out to be an agony for the HR fraternity, yet. With globalisation, teams become more and more integrated and agile, which HRs must run fast to cope with. Increasing number of remote, and arguably virtual, employees demand that the HRs tighten their belts.

Attraction, Training and Retention

Organisations today want not job-seekers, but talents. For example, in IT, with the massive ‘attack’ of automation over the services sector has diminished the glitter of the old glossy, silky texture of the industry to a great extent. Companies today want to find talents (“attraction”) rather than applicants finding them for jobs (“acquisition”). The onus is on the HR team.

The new organisation have a diverse workforce that constantly looks for enhancing their skill set. The old school training curriculum is undergoing a thorough revamp, which is, yet again, equally agonizing and ecstatic for HRs. Starting from the training modes—virtual to gamification to anytime anywhere learning platforms—to the training content, organisations are thoroughly revamping their L&D strategies with the Gen Z in mind.

Another area of concern for the HR is retention. It’s way beyond creating a good brand; stories float about youngsters rejecting offers from big brands to choose what they want to do in small companies. Retention plans of the new age is another agony for HRs, planning of which needs a thorough analysis of their workforce as well as the industry trends. People don’t just stay back for money.

HR Tech: the future

As it goes without saying, HR Tech is already here. Yesteryears’ Personnel Manager changed to HR, and then got transformed into People Enablers over a period of time. The new role of HRs will be that of technology and business leaders enabling people functions with the help of cutting edge tech. Coming of tech into HR will certainly reduce the job opportunities of the existing HR workforce, but wait! It’s a two-sided coin again. While this is seen as an ‘oh-my-god-am-I-gonna-lose-it’ scenario, why don’t we look at the brighter side of it? It gives us room for learning technology and pouring it into what we have been doing, thereby making a yet greater, happier, better workplace! Ain’t it ecstatic?!

Disclaimer: Any of the discussions above does not reflect the views of my present or previous employers. Views are all personal.

Employee Engagement and College of Engineering Chengannur: An HR Case Study

There’s something between College of Engineering Chengannur and CECians—the students and alumni of the college that binds the duo together. That’s never-ending loyalty and affection of the students and alumni of the college for their alma-mater.

College of Engineering Chengannur is my undergraduate college where I did my Bachelor of Technology in Computer Science and Engineering, and graduated in 2010. During our time, there were less than 220 students in an entire batch all the streams put together. The college was the first Govt. self-financing engineering college in the State of Kerala. When it started in 1993, it was a much sought-after college in the state.

The unique feature of most of the CECians that I have noticed is their affection for the college. The moment when an alumnus in a random crowd happens to say he’s a CECian, the other one in the crowd picks it up promptly and they instantly become family. This feature has helped the students (and alumni of the college) immensely, especially in networking and career prospects. CECians have a thing.

The sole intention of this article is not to ‘market’ my alma mater, but to use it as a case study as to how organisations can learn from it to build a highly-engaged crowd in their teams. There are no numbers since I have not conducted a formal study.

While I think of the reasons why there’s a high grade of the sense of belongingness to the college, it takes me to the fact that there have been a variety of events that happen at the college every year. Thanks to being a government college, most of the events are envisaged, planned and executed by the students alone. This gives them a sense of responsibility, pride and achievement.

Now what an HR should learn from this scenario: there are technical groups, arts club, sports club, National Service Scheme, Nature Club, multiple sports events, stages of art expressions, union senate, etc. In fact, there’s a surplus of forums and activities for a comparatively smaller college like ours.

The above fact has resulted in a very desirable scenario—that each of the students will be part of at least one of the activities/groups. There are exceptions, but on a negligible quantity. At the end of the four-year course, there would be at least an event/activity that every student has volunteered in/participated in.

Employee Engagement Credits: https://unsplash.com — Credits: https://unsplash.com

Students and the college recognise each such successful programs. This adds to the sense of achievement of the students. This ‘boost of pride’ is the sole reasoning for the immaculate belongingness of its students and alumni. That stays for good.

I was coming to it—the lesson an HR can take from this is how s/he should plan the engagement activities in the organisation. It’s imperative that the engagement initiates that the HR department drives at their organisation touch the sentiments of the employees. A wise selection of engagement events will strive to touch the likeness or interests of all employees.

It goes without saying that a single initiative alone cannot attract the interest of all employees. Hence, it is important to know what your employees are interested in. Some of the employees may have a personal interest in painting, some in music and some other in badminton. To the best extent possible, a good HR engagement practice and design will always have events planned to touch these interests of the employees, at least once in a year. It’s simpler in SMEs, but in larger companies with HRBP concepts implemented, the same ideology can be extrapolated on smaller teams.

Let me close by saying this—the intention is not to create a heat map of the hobbies of your employees and then take the mode of it as the next engagement activity. But the intention is to identify those employees whose sentiments are barely touched and to address them.

How about a deeper analytics on the engagement score vs hobbies of the employees for better insights on what next you should take up as an engagement activity in the company? Will write about it in a few days, but would like to know your thoughts first on what’s written above. Let me know in comments.

Happy HRing 🙂

A Complete Guide on EPF UAN Unified Portal

Many of the employees (and so do the HRs) have a tough time meddling with errors on EPF (UAN) Unified Portal. Here’s a short guide to various options on the portal.

If you are a fresher and never worked before

That means, this is your first job. Congratulations! Your payslips normally will bear the Universal Account Number (UAN), which is a unique EPF identification number. Whenever you change an organisation, your EPF number may change, but the UAN will (and should) be the same. If you don’t get it, please contact your HR, who can help you find it.

You should use your UAN number for logging into the UAN Portal. First, you will need to activate the UAN, instructions for which are given in the ‘Activating the UAN’ section.

If you previously worked, and have a UAN already

If you have work experience, and already possess a UAN, you MUST inform the HR within a week of your joining. The HR will not, in that case, generate a UAN for you. You should not have more than one UAN in your name (if you have more than one, you should link them).

So, you now have a UAN. As you’re new to Current Company, the company will generate a PF number for you (which will be different from your previous company’s PF number). And then, the new PF number will be linked to your existing UAN.

But now you have two PF numbers (old company’s and Current Company’s) though both are linked to a single UAN. You should in that case, transfer the funds from previous PF account to the new PF account. This will help you in easier PF withdrawal in future. How to do this? Read the ‘Online Services’ section.

Activating the UAN

Probably, you have already activated the UAN in the past. Forget this step in that case.

If you had previously activated the UAN, but forgot the password, click on the ‘Forgot Password’ link on the UAN portal. This will help you reset your password using OTP. When you set the new password, please make sure that it is as per the directions given in bullet point 10 below.

If you have never activated your UAN or you just got your UAN for the first time, you should activate it first before starting to use the UAN portal. The following steps will help you do the same:

Visit https://unifiedportal-mem.epfindia.gov.in/memberinterface
Click on the ‘Activate UAN’ link
You can see four radio buttons there. Click on ‘UAN’ and enter your UAN. Alternatively, you can give any other three options (Member ID, Aadhaar or PAN). Out of the four options, you need to give only one.
Give your name as in the payslip
Enter your date of birth as in the official records (DD/MM/YYYY format)
Give your mobile number
Give your email ID (optional)
Enter the captcha image shown, and click ‘Get Authorisation Pin’
You will get an OTP on your mobile number. Enter the OTP and click Submit.
You will be prompted to set a password. Give a password.
1. The password should start with a small letter.
2. The password should have at least one capital letter.
3. The password should have at least one digit.
4. The password should have at least one special character (@#$%&)
Your UAN is activated
Now you can login to the portal using UAN as your username, and the password you just set as your password.

UAN Card

Up on login to the UAN portal, click on the ‘UAN Card’ link on the homepage. This will open a PDF, which is your UAN card:

Save the PDF and keep it somewhere in your personal digital space for future access/reference.
Verify that your name appearing on the UAN Card is correct. If not, contact the HR.
Verify that your father’s name appearing on the UAN Card is correct. If not, contact the HR.
The KYC status shown there should be ‘Yes’. If not, it means that you have not provided some KYC (Know Your Customer) information. How to update it? Read on!

Profile

Click on ‘View’ link on the UAN portal, which will give you the following options:

Profile
1. You can see your basic profile information here
2. You can change your mobile number and email ID
Service History
1. This page will show your previous work history, plus the existing one.
2. If you do not have previous work history (where you made EPF contribution), only Current Company’s record will appear on this page.
UAN Card
1. This will also lead you to the UAN Card page
Passbook
1. For now, the passbook which shows the amounts credited, withdrawn, transferred, interests, etc. are not shown on the UAN portal.
2. Instead, you should go to https://passbook.epfindia.gov.in/MemberPassBook/Login.jsp and login using the UAN and the same password that you use at UAN portal
3. Note that the passbook will be available only after six hours of activating the UAN.

Manage Your Account

Click on ‘Manage’ link on the UAN portal, which will give you the following options:

Contact Details
1. You can change your mobile number and email ID.
2. You will need OTPs to change the existing details.
Modify Basic Details
1. Before proceeding to the ‘KYC’ section, click on ‘Modify Basic Details’ section.
2. This is the place where you can modify your details to what’s on the Aadhaar card.
3. Before giving Aadhaar details, please make sure that:
  1. Your Aadhaar card shows your full date of birth (not just year). If not, please contact an Akshaya Centre (if in Kerala), who can help you add your full date of birth.
  2. Your Aadhaar is seeded with a mobile number and an email ID. If not, please contact an Akshaya Centre (if in Kerala), who can help you add a mobile number and email ID to your Aadhaar.
4. You can give your Aadhaar number, name, date of birth, and gender
5. If you have previously seeded Aadhaar to the UAN portal, the ‘Modify Basic Details’ option will lead you to a page which shows ‘Aadhaar is already verified. Your details aren’t editable’. This means that Aadhaar is already seeded and you cannot change the basic details any longer.
KYC
1. This is a very important activity. On this page, you can give your KYC information.
2. You must provide the following information
  1. Bank Account: Give your personal bank account details (your Current Company Salary account may also be given if you are sure you will use the account even after separation from the company. If you’re not sure, it is recommended that you give any of your personal bank account details here).
  2. PAN: If you have PAN, give the details. This is highly recommended, and will be helpful when (if) you intend to withdraw PF money in future. Sometimes, the portal may show ‘information mismatch’ error. This is because your name on the UAN card and the name in the PAN database do not match. A probable solution would be to change the name in the PAN database to what’s there in your Aadhaar. This change can be done at the PAN website online or by visiting an Akshaya Centre (if in Kerala).
  3. Aadhaar: This is highly recommended. Giving Aadhaar will ensure that you have a smooth withdrawal and other transactional processes in the future. If you have provided Aadhaar in the “Step 2: Modify Basic Details” above, you need not give Aadhaar again.
3. Other details
  1. Update of other details like Passport, Election ID, Driving License, etc. are recommended, but not mandatory.
E-nomination
1. This is a mandatory activity.
2. Make sure that you have added minimum KYC (Aadhar, Bank details) before you attempt this option.
3. E-nomination is a facility through which you nominate one of your family members to receive the benefits upon your unfortunate death.
4. First, you will need to add the Family details. The family includes your spouse, children, dependent mother, dependent father, deceased son’s widow, deceased son’s children.
  1. Note that in-laws, friends, and other relatives are not allowed to be added.
  2. You will need to provide each family member’s Aadhaar number, Name, Date of Birth, Gender, Relation and Address.
  3. Click on ‘Add row’ to add more family members.
  4. Click ‘Save’ when you’re done.
5. Once the family members are added, you can proceed to choose your nominees. Of the family members, you can choose whom you want your nominee to be. You can split the nomination by percentage. For example, you can choose to give 25% to your mother, 25% to your father, 30% to your spouse, 20% to your daughter. The total should be 100%.
6. Click ‘Save EPF Nomination’
7. You will then need to provide authorisation on the page that appears, for the nomination to take effect. This step is important.
  1. Click on the button shown below ‘eSign’
  2. Select your name in the pop-up window that appears and click on ‘Generate OTP’
  3. Enter the OTP that you receive in your mobile and click ‘Sign Document’
8. You can add more family members later, as the case may be, and create new nominations which will nullify existing nominations.

Account Operations

You can use this link to change your login password. Make sure you conform to the password norms mentioned in bullet point 10 of the ‘Activating the UAN’ section.

Online Services

This is the place where you can process certain transactions such as:

One Member – One EPF Account (Transfer Request)
1. If you earlier had a PF number (in previous companies you worked at), this link will help you transfer the amounts in such accounts to your present PF account.
2. This step is highly recommended, as it will smoothen the PF withdrawal processes in the future.
3. Note that you can transfer amount from a previous PF account to the present one, only if your previous company has marked your exit date (last working day) at the EPF portal.
  1. You can know whether your date of exit (DoE EPF) has been marked by previous company or not, by visiting the Service History.
  2. If this has not been marked, transfer request will not work. Highly recommended that you contact the HR department of your previous company and request them to mark the last working day at the EPF portal. This is a mandatory step, ignoring which may cause delay in future claims.
4. Click on the ‘One Member – One EPF Account (Transfer Request)’ link
5. On the screen that follows, under the section titled ‘Step 1’, do the following:
  1. Choose ‘Present Employer’ or ‘Previous Employer’ against the ‘Attestation through’ field.
  2. Give your UAN against the ‘Member ID / UAN’ field.
  3. Click on ‘Get Details’
  4. You will be shown all the companies you have worked for, including Current Company.
  5. Choose the company’s name from which you want to transfer the money (old company). You can choose only one at a time, in case you have more than one companies you have previously worked with.
  6. Click on ‘Get OTP’. Enter the OTP received on your mobile, and click ‘Submit’
  7. It can take up to 1 month for the transfer to reflect on Passbook.
Track Claim Status
1. You can track the status of the claims and transfer requests that you have previously applied for.
2. The status ‘Approved by Employer’ means that the request by you has been approved by Current Company. ‘Pending Field Office Approval’ status means the request is now being verified at the EPF office. ‘Approved’ or ‘Completed’ status means that the claim/transfer request has been successfully completed.
Claim (FORM 31,19 & 10C)
1. Note that the EPF department encourages online applications. Offline applications tend to take a lot of time to be approved, while online applications are recommended and fast.
2. For making a claim/withdrawal request, you should have completed the following processes:
  1. Aadhaar is seeded to UAN portal.
  2. You have successfully transferred all previous PF account amounts to the latest PF account (the status of transfer request should be checked to ensure that the amounts have been successfully transferred; this process can take up to 1 month and hence it is recommended that the transfer process be initiated when you are still on the job, in advance).
  3. Your Aadhaar has a mobile number and an email ID linked to it. If you do not have them linked, please visit an Akshaya Centre (if in Kerala) who can help you complete this process. Without the mobile number and email ID having been linked to Aadhaar, online claim will not succeed.
3. ‘Claim (FORM 31,19 & 10C)’ is the link for submitting online applications for claims and PF withdrawals.
  1. Give the last four digits of your bank account to which the claim amounts should be transferred for verification. Click ‘Verify’.
    1. Note that only previously added Bank Account details can be used at this stage. That’s why it’s highly recommended to add a personal bank account in the KYC section, while you’re still on the job, in advance, since the approval of your bank account addition might take a few days to reflect.
  2. Click on ‘I agree’ on the pop-up window that appears.
  3. Proceed for giving OTP.
  4. You can come back to the ‘Track Claim Status’ section to see the progress of your transfer at any point of time.

Additional Information

An EPF member can withdraw the PF amounts if s/he has been without a job for at least 2 months after separation from the company. There are certain other situations where you can withdraw the PF amounts, which are available at: https://www.epfindia.gov.in/site_docs/PDFs/MiscPDFs/OCS_FAQ_Eligibility_102017.pdf
There’s a mobile app for availing various services and passbook of EPF: https://web.umang.gov.in/web/#/