New Delhi, Jul 14 (IANS): The Centre on Sunday said that 27 establishments have surrendered their exemption in the last two years, adding about 30,000 employees and an amount of Rs 1688.82 crore to the Fund under the Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO).

These establishments prefer to let EPFO manage their employees' Provident Fund (PF) directly due to improved services while focusing on their core business activities.

The Ministry of Labour and Employment said the EPFO has taken multiple steps in the last year to streamline compliance procedures for establishments exempted under the EPF Act.

"With faster claim settlement, higher rates of return, strong monitoring, and ease of engagement, services provided to both establishments and members by EPFO are continuously improving," said the ministry.

Establishments that wish to manage the PF corpus of their employees need to seek exemption under Section 17 of the EPF Act.

As of March 31, 2023, there were 1,002 exempted establishments managing a corpus of Rs 3,52,000 crore of 31,20,323 members.