Online PAN verification: You may not be able to invest in post office schemes if there is a mismatch in PAN details

The post office will verify the legitimacy of your Permanent Account Number (PAN) details by cross-checking them with the Income Tax Department. This is to ensure that your PAN is linked with your Aadhaar and that the name and date of birth provided by you are correct. Do note that from April 1, 2023, it is mandatory to provide PAN and Aadhaar details to invest in post office schemes. In case of any discrepancy, you may not be able to invest in these schemes.

For PAN validation, the CBS system is integrated with the Protean e-Gov Technologies (formerly NSDL) system. Based on the responses received from the Protean system, PANs are validated in Finacle; this system was in place until April 30, 2024.

PAN, Aadhaar become mandatory for making investments in PPF, NSC, other small savings schemes

A notification from the Department of Post issued on May 7, 2024, stated that the Protean system concerning PAN validation has been modified as of May 1, 2024.

The following appropriate changes are under development, which will not allow manual intervention in the future (i) The system, to restrict the acceptance of PANs in case of the following responses

Furthermore, in accordance with the provisions of Rule 6 of the Government Savings Promotion General Rules 201g amended via notification No. G.s.R. 238(E) circulated via SB order No. 8/2023 dated 03.04.2023, it should be ensured that the valid PANs are mandated to be accepted from the depositor on the date of happening of any of the following events.

1. The balance at any point of time in the account exceeds fifty thousand rupees; or
2. The aggregate of all credits in the account in any financial year exceeds one lakh rupees; or
3. The aggregate of all withdrawals and transfers in a month from the account exceeds ten thousand rupees; (b) ln such cases where the conditions stated in para (a) are not applicable, the depositors should not be forced to submit PAN mandatorily at the time of opening of account. Account may be opened on obtaining Form-60 which should be replaced with PAN by the Depositors, within a period of two months from the date of happening of any of the events mentioned in para (a) above, whichever is the earliest.