EPFO adds net 1.6 mn members in January; 808,000 enroll for 1st time

Retirement fund body EPFO added a net 1.6 million subscribers in January 2024, according to payroll data released on Sunday.

Around 808,000 members were enrolled for the first time in January 2024, a labour ministry statement said on Sunday.

The Employees' Provident Fund Organization's (EPFO) provisional payroll highlighted that the EPFO has added 1.602 million members on a net basis in January 2024, the ministry said.

A noticeable aspect of the data is the dominance of the 18-25 age group, constituting a significant 56.41 per cent of the total new members added in January 2024 indicating the majority of individuals joining the organized workforce are youth, primarily first-time job seekers.

The payroll data highlighted that approximately 1.217 million members exited and subsequently rejoined EPFO.

These members switched their jobs and re-joined the establishments covered under the ambit of EPFO and opted to transfer their accumulations instead of applying for final settlement thus, safeguarding long-term financial well-being and extending their social security protection, it stated.

Gender-wise analysis of payroll data unveiled that out of 808,000 new members, around 205,000 are new female members. Also, the net female member addition during the month stood at around 303,000.

The female member addition is indicative of a broader shift towards a more inclusive and diverse workforce.

Month-on-month comparison of industry-wise data displays growth in the members working in establishments engaged in the industries viz. Financing establishment, Establishment engaged in manufacture & marketing servicing & usage of computers, hospitals etc.

Of the total net membership, around 40.71 per cent is from expert services (consisting of manpower suppliers, normal contractors, security services, miscellaneous activities etc).

The payroll data is provisional since the data generation is a continuous exercise, as updating employee records is a continuous process.

The previous data hence gets updated every month.

From the month of April 2018, EPFO has been releasing payroll data covering the period from September 2017 onwards.

In monthly payroll data, the count of members joining the EPFO for the first time through a validated Universal Account Number (UAN), existing members exiting from coverage of EPFO and those who exited but re-joining as members, is taken to arrive at net monthly payroll.