EPFO Portal Down: Ex-IAS Officer Slams ‘Utter Incompetence’

The Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation portal has reportedly been down for several weeks, drawing criticism from former IAS officer and activist Kannan Gopinathan.

Expressing his frustration in a social media post, Gopinathan accused the authorities of holding people's hard-earned money as “ransom” due to their unresolved technical issues.

Gopinathan, who resigned from the civil service in protest against restrictions in Jammu and Kashmir post-Article 370 abrogation, tagged Union Labour Minister Mansukh Mandaviya in his post, urging him to take note of the situation.

“Dear Minister @mansukhmandviya, hopefully you're aware that the EPFO portal is down for weeks now," he said in a post on X.

He further alleged that people’s “hard-earned money” was being “held as ransom” due to a “software update". “Utter incompetence that you're not able to resolve it for this long!" he added.

He also attached a screenshot of the Unified Member Portal, which displayed a “service unavailable” message.

The error message cited, “maintenance downtime or capacity problems” as the reason for the disruption on the website, asking users to try again later. However, no official clarification or estimated resolution timeline has been provided by EPFO.

Gopinathan’s post quickly gained traction, with many users sharing their difficulties in accessing EPF services.

“Crores of Indians have their hard-earned money sitting in PF. Most of the time, the portal doesn’t work, and these folks reject the transfer/claim randomly. There is no way to reach out to them other than paying sizeable bribe via agents or just rant in social media!” one user claimed.

There were a few sarcastic comments as well. While one user wrote, “Don’t think it is bug. It is feature to delay the payout to citizens,” another stated that even after the EPFO website is restored, users will face persistent issues like “father’s name mismatch".

One user also criticised the frequent password expirations and a frustrating reset process.

Kannan Gopinathan's post comes at a time when the government has been pushing for digitisation in the EPF. The Employees' Provident Fund Organisation recently introduced a major update to its regulations, allowing EPFO members to modify their Aadhaar-linked Universal Account Number details, without the need to submit supporting documents. This change is expected to reduce the time required for profile updates.

Established in 1952 under the Employees' Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, the EPFO is responsible for managing and regulating provident fund accounts in India. The Unified Member Portal serves as a digital platform for employers and employees to access EPF-related services.