EPFO adds 14.63 lakh net members in November 2024, new members up by 19% YoY

Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO), the retirement fund body, added as many as 14.63 lakh net members in November 2024, marking a growth of 4.88% year-on-year (YoY), as per the latest provisional payroll data released by the Ministry of Labour & Employment on January 22. The net member additions grew by 9.07% as compared to October 2024.

The growth highlights the rising employment opportunities and increased awareness of employee benefits, fueled further by EPFO’s initiatives, the ministry said in a release.

Nearly 8.74 lakh new members were added in November, up by 18.8% YoY and 16.58% against October.

The data showed a dominance of the 18-25 age group with 4.81 lakh new member additions in this group, making up 54.97% of the total additions in November 2024. Net member additions for this age group are at 5.68 lakh for November, highlighting a surge of 7.96% as against October.

This is in consonance with the earlier trend which indicates that most individuals joining the organised workforce are youth, primarily first-time job seekers, the ministry said.

As data generation and updating employee records is a continuous process, the payroll data provided by the ministry is provisional.

Other key highlights

• The data shows that almost 14.39 lakh members exited and subsequently rejoined EPFO in November. This is an 11.47% increase as compared to October and a 34.75% increase when compared to November 2023. 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 a final settlement. This ensures their social security protection and long-term financial stability.

• Gender-wise analysis of payroll data reveals that out of the new members added during November, nearly 2.4 lakh new members are female, depicting an increase of 14.94%. On a year-on-year basis, this resulted in a 23.62% growth. Moreover, the net female member addition during the month stood at 3.13 lakh, marking an increase of nearly 12.16% from October 2024 and an 11.75% rise against November 2023. The increase in female member additions is indicative of a broader shift towards a more inclusive and diverse workforce, the ministry said.

• When analysed state-wise, the data shows that net member addition in the top five states/Union Territories comprises around 59.42% of net member addition. This adds up to a total of around 8.69 lakh net members during November. Maharashtra led the charts by adding 20.86% of net members during the month. Furthermore, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Gujarat, Delhi, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh individually added more than 5% to the total net members during the month.