Employees' Enrolment Campaign 2026 closed on 31 October: what it offered and what to do now

What changed

The Employees' Provident Funds Scheme, 2026, notified in the Gazette on 29 June 2026 as G.S.R. 525(E), carries a set of special provisions. Part A of them is the Employees' Enrolment Campaign, 2026. The idea is the same as the 2017 campaign: an employer who left employees out of PF comes forward voluntarily, declares them, pays what is due, and in return the damages for the omission are a flat amount instead of the full section 14B levy. EPFO's order of 8 July 2026 put it into operation from 1 July 2026.

According to the gazette text, any employer, whether previously covered or not, may apply for coverage and enrol employees who joined the establishment between 1 April 2009 and 31 March 2026, who are employed as on the date of declaration, and who for any reason were not enrolled earlier. The declaration is made online on EPFO's portal; EPFO doesn't need to have found the gap first.

Two things make it worth attention. First, the damages: ₹100, paid with the declaration, rather than a percentage that grows with the delay. Second, the employee share: the gazette waives the member's contribution for the period 1 April 2009 to 31 March 2026 where it was never recovered from the employee. You pay the employer share, interest under section 127 of the Code (section 7Q of the old Act), and administrative charges. That is what makes the arithmetic manageable for a small establishment.

It came into force on 1 July 2026 and ceased to operate on 31 October 2026. Because the contributions are paid through an ECR first and the declaration is then linked to that TRRN, the payment has to be inside the window too.

Who is affected

In my experience the employees who get left out of PF fall into a few recognisable groups:

If any of those rings true, the campaign is for you, with one limit that catches people out: the gazette covers employees who are in service on the date of declaration. Employees who have already left cannot be declared under it. What the gazette does say is that EPFO will take no action against an employer who uses the campaign in respect of employees who had already left, provided the employer gives an undertaking that every existing eligible employee has been declared and that no deducted employee share is lying undeposited. So the campaign protects you on leavers only if you are complete on current staff.

A word on contractors. Under the EPF Scheme 2026 the principal employer's liability for an unregistered contractor's workers is explicit. If you use security or manpower agencies, read principal employer PF liability alongside this post and look at contractor compliance. A campaign declaration can be the cleanest way to close that gap.

If you missed the window

Without the campaign, an unenrolled employee is simply a default. The work is the same; what changes is the cost.

1. Start current contributions now. Put every left-out employee who is still on the rolls on the next ECR. Every month you wait adds to the arrears and the damages.
2. Work out the arrears from each employee's correct date of coverage: both shares this time, since the waiver of the employee share was a campaign benefit, plus interest under section 7Q and administrative charges.
3. Pay and write to EPFO. Remit the arrears through ECR and send the regional office a short letter listing the employees, the periods and the TRRNs. A voluntary, documented disclosure is the best position you can be in when the inquiry comes.
4. Expect an inquiry and damages. EPFO assesses the dues under section 7A (section 125 of the Code) and levies damages under section 14B at the normal rates. If damages end up being levied for defaults from before 14 June 2024, check whether VISHWAS 2026, open until 29 December 2026, can settle them; I check that case by case.

How the campaign worked

For reference, and in case EPFO reopens it, this is what a campaign declaration involved.

1. Build the list. Go through payroll, attendance and contractor bills for April 2009 onward and mark every person who was paid wages but has no Member ID under your code. Start with people still on the rolls, then leavers.
2. Fix the date of coverage for each one. It is the first month they should have been a member, which is often their date of joining but not always. This date becomes their date of joining PF and follows them for life, so get it right.
3. Generate UANs for employees who have none, using the face-authentication route on the UMANG app that the gazette prescribes, and link existing UANs for those who already had one from a previous job. Their Aadhaar and Aadhaar-linked mobile number are needed for this. Pension membership follows the wage ceiling in force, and an employee who joined after 1 September 2014 above the ceiling does not become a pension member.
4. Work out the contributions due from each employee's date of joining: the employer share for the whole period, the employee share only where it was actually deducted and kept back, interest under section 127 of the Code (section 7Q of the old Act), and administrative charges. The employee share is waived where it was never deducted.
5. Pay through an ECR first, then declare. The gazette's order is: UANs generated with face authentication on the UMANG app, contributions paid through an ECR, then the online declaration linked to that ECR's TRRN, with the ₹100 damages. Multiple declarations are allowed. Keep the acknowledgement and the TRRN for every employee declared.
6. Tell the employees. They will see new Member IDs appear in their UAN. If they have moved on, a short message explaining the dates saves a grievance later.

What this does not change

• Current compliance. Employees enrolled under the campaign are on the normal monthly ECR from the next month. The campaign fixes the past; it doesn't change the present.
• The principal employer's duty. Declaring a contractor's workers under your own code is a fix, not a transfer of responsibility. The contractor arrangement still needs to be verified every month.
• Fraud or deliberate concealment. The campaign is for omissions. A declaration made by misrepresenting or suppressing facts about the employees, their employment or its terms is void from the start, and the employer faces action under the Code.
• Concluded assessments. Where an inquiry for the period has already been concluded, the campaign does not reopen it. Where one is pending, you can still declare, but both shares are payable for the inquiry period and the benefit is the ₹100 notional damages.
• Damages for late payment of enrolled employees. Those remain under section 14B unless settled through VISHWAS 2026.

What you can do yourself for free

When specialist help may be useful

• You have left-out employees across several years and aren't sure which dates of coverage will stand up.
• Some of them are contractor workers and the contractor's records are poor or missing.
• An ex-employee has already complained, and you want to know whether the campaign still helps.
• You need the declaration, the arrears and the record remediation done together, with evidence that will survive an inspection.

Send me the number of people involved and the years they cover. I'll tell you honestly whether this is a one-afternoon portal job or something you should not do alone.

Not sure whether to declare, or how far back to go?

The hard part of a campaign declaration isn't the form. It is deciding who belongs on it: the contract worker the agency never covered, the person hired above the old ceiling who was wrongly treated as excluded, the branch that never got its own code. Declare too little and the gap remains. Declare the wrong date and you create a service-history problem for the employee.

I help employers build the list from payroll and attendance records, fix the dates of coverage, file the declaration and the contributions, and keep the evidence that shows the campaign was used in good faith. NidhiSetu is independent and not affiliated with EPFO; the campaign itself is free to use on EPFO's portal, and if your list is short and clean I'll say so.

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