Pune: The Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) of Pune has been receiving complaints from members about phone calls made to them in the name of PF officials concerning benefits of pension. The regional commissioners have warned the public against such spurious calls and fictitious offers.
The EPFO office is divided into two regional offices - Regional Commissioner Office 1 at Camp and Regional Commissioner Office 2 at Akurdi. There are lakhs of members in both offices. In the recent past, the members are approaching the commissioners to resolve the issue that they are receiving calls to pay good amounts and get benefits and bonus of PF amount.
“In the past few months, we received complaints about members receiving calls in the name of officials of EPFO. The members are approaching directly and providing us the phone number which are mostly landline numbers. According to the members, the callers asked them to pay Rs 30,000 and they will be liable to get benefits and bonus of Rs 2 lakh from EPFO. The calls are made by fraudsters and we appeal to members to not believe these calls. The government organisation never calls to any members or citizens to pay the amount and get benefits and bonus,” Arun Kumar, Regional Commissioner I of EPFO, Pune told Sakal Times.
Recently, a call was received by a member resident of Pimpri and a pension holder. The member approached the Regional Commissioner at Akurdi and provided details of phone calls. The commissioner took cognizance of the calls and asked an officer to look into the matter.
“It is observed that members of the publicare still receiving spurious calls in the name of officials of EPFO. The caller claimed that EPFO is distributing bonuses to the subscribers out of the fund of EPFO. Also, the fraudsters claim the member would receive bonuses being distributed by EPFO after depositing the money,” Amitabh Prakash, Regional Office II, Akurdi told Sakal Times.
“Persons claiming to be from Grievance Cell of EPFO are making calls in continuation with a complaint made against a subscriber and resolving the EPF/Pension cases and resolving their grievance and release of benefits for which they have to fulfil certain formalities including payment of money. The EPFO or any Central Government office never calls citizens to pay money to avail benefits or bonuses. If any member of public notices such instance he or she may not share any personal information to such person. For any query/information, the member can contact to our office or Public Relations Officer on phone 020-27640762” he added.
