How to check your PF balance online

You can check your Employee Provident Fund (E.P.F) balance online, if you know your PF account number. But all PF offices do not support this facility and you can check the PF balance only if your PF office supports this facility. Also, if your company has a separate trust for EPF you won't be able to check it online at EPFO website.

Here is the procedure to check the PF balance online:

1. Go to http://epfoservices.in/epfo/member_balance/member_balance_office_select.php

2. Select the state where your EPF office is located

3. Select your EPF office and the member balance information window will be displayed.

4. Enter your details in the member balance information. For example, if your PF number is KN/xxxxx/yyyyyy, KN indicates the state, xxxxx is the establishment code for your organization and yyyyyy is your PF number. Employee PF account number has five text boxes. The first two fields will be filled automatically and enter the remaining information as per the following steps.

a. Enter the xxxxx part of your PF number as the establishment code in the third text field.

b. Enter the extension number or fill it as 000 if there is no extension number in the fourth text field.

c. Enter the yyyyyy part of your PF account number in the fifth text field.

d. Enter your name as per EPFO records.

e. Enter your mobile number.

f. Read the terms and conditions and click agree if you are fine with it

g. Click Submit.

You PF balance information will be sent to you as SMS.

For detailed information about EPF, read my blog post http://sreejithsblog.blogspot.in/2013/05/understanding-epf.html

Neelakasham Pachakadal Chuvanna Bhoomi - A traveller's delight

Neelakasham Pachakadal Chuvanna Bhoomi (English: Blue Skies, Green Waters, Red Earth) is a brilliant attempt by Samir Thair to make a road trip movie for the first time in Malayalam cinema. Supported by Hashir Mohammad's brilliant script and excellent visuals by Gireesh Gangadharan the movie has turned out as a beautiful visual treat.Dulkar Salman has done a superb job as Kasi-the lead actor. The story is about Kasi - a youngster who completed his engineering and Suni - Kasi's intimate friend and their journey from Kerala to North Eastern India on bikes. Their warm friendship and comradarie is beautifully captured in the film. Through this journey with out any specific aim, Kasi wants to get over his past relationship.( I too had a similar experience some time back traveling with a friend on a bike who was in the same state as Kasi :-) )

On their way, they see and feel the real India through the people they meet during the journey.Inspired by the people he had met during the journey, he decided to search for his lover Assi- a young woman from Nagaland - who came to Kerala to study engineering in the same college where Kasi and Suni studied. They were attacked by thieves, got into a group of hippies , captured by Naxals, witnessed the riots in Assam, enjoyed the song of sadhus and consumed bhang with them, experienced the anger of Naga's and learn more about themselves and India. Along with the journey, the film progresses though the college life of Kasi and Assi and their struggle to get the approval from Kasi's orthodox family who first accepted their love but succumbed to pressures of the orthodox society they were part of. Kasi's college life is almost the same story of many youngsters in Kerala. The idealistic left activism they cherish as students and the confusion they face later in the real life when they have to work as part of the same system they opposed once. The confusion of Kasi about his identity is actually the same confusion many experience when they are constantly reminded about their identity by the society even though they had came out of their traditional beliefs and customs. The naxal village portrayed in the films throws some light on the threats of crony capitalism on the life of villagers in India and their struggle to fight against it to protect their homeland. Finally after all his struggles Kasi got back his sweet heart from Nagaland and starts his return journey and the film ends. I felt that the climax would have been more powerful than the ordinary climax that was shown in the movie.

The movie is a delight to watch for a travel enthusiast who can identify with the joy of seeing new places and cherish the experience of a long journey. The film encourages every traveler to explore the new horizons and seek the thrill and excitement that every journey offers. Exploring India is a great learning experience and makes you a much better person. The visuals are beautiful and as a unique attempt to make road trip as a theme the effort is commendable.


The film has it's own weaknesses too. I felt that some scenes in the second half were dragging. The climax was just ordinary nothing special. There was more scope for covering the diversity and the variety that India offers, but may be two and half hours may not be a sufficient.

I heard from my friend that Hashir Mohammad- the script writer of the movie, actually traveled to North East immediately after finishing his studies on a bike and got inspired to make this movie :-).

Common Banking Interview Questions

There are a lot of people applying for jobs in public sector banks in India and the competitive examination is also tough to crack. State bank conducts separate examination to recruit staff and other banks recruit through a common exam known as IBPS.

Here are some of the commonly asked questions related to banking that helps you to prepare for the interview:

What is repo rate ?

Repo rate is the interest rate at which Reserve Bank of India (RBI) lends money to the commercial banks for a short term against securities. Suppose you are a small shop owner (commerical bank) who buys goods from a whole saler in debt keeping some thing valuable as collateral. In return, you have to pay a higher price mutually agreed between both of you later and take your collateral back. The profit the wholesaler takes from you can be called as repo rate.

Current repo rate is 8.5 percent.

Note: These values vary according to RBI policy.

What is reverse repo rate ?

Reverse repo rate is the rate at which commercial banks lend money to RBI

Suppose the whole-saler is in shortage of goods and you have stocks of extra goods and you are willing to sell the goods to the whole saler. The rate at which you give goods to the whole saler can be called as reverse repo rate.

Current reverse repo rate is 7.5 percent


What is bank rate ?

Bank rate is the interest charged by RBI on loans by commercial banks. Here collateral is not required.
The current rate is about 6.0 percent.


What is CRR ?

CRR is the ratio of funds banks have to keep with Reserve Bank as per norms. If CRR ratio is less banks will have more money to conduct business.

Current CRR is 6 percent

What is NEFT ?

There are two modes for transferring funds from one bank account to another account in India using electronic fund transfer.
They are National Electronic Fund Transfer (NEFT) and Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS). In NEFT transactions are processed in batches and in RTGS the transaction is done immediately. So, RTGS is faster than NEFT.


Note: I am not an expert in banking domain. I collected these information when my sister was preparing for the IBPS P.O interview :-)