Here's how you can transfer provident fund from private trust to EPF

Provident Fund (PF) is one of the key investment options an employee banks upon to secure his or her post- retirement life.

If you have switched jobs and are looking to transfer your PF balance from a private trust to EPFO, here’s some help:

What is a private trust?

To manage employee’s contribution, an organisation can form its own PF trust after acquiring exemption from the government. There are 1,375 such companies in India like TCS, Wipro, Hindustan Unilever (HUL), Reliance and public sector organizations like Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL).

These companies are exempted from contributing their EPF corpus with  EPFO. Instead, they can manage that money with their own trusts. So, the private PF trusts function according to the same rules as the EPF and the members get UAN (Universal Account Number).

Transfer process

Employees need to fill Form 13 with details of former and current employer, and get it attested by the previous company, says Bhanu Pratap Sharma, former enforcement officer at EPFO.

Details like previous PF account number, bank account details, office details will be needed. Bank account details are required for the purpose of verification.

Checking PF balance with private trust

If your PF contributions are being managed by a private trust, you can check your balance from either your salary slips or your company’s self-service portal. You can also get in touch with the HR department for an update on your balance.