Reclaiming IEPF shares

[vishwa.bhat19]

Hi All,

Good Day!!

If this thread is something that should not have been started, I am sorry and the admins can kindly close it.

This is regarding Shares that were bought back in the early 90s and the certificate is in the form of a Physical Certificate. If the dividends are not claimed for 7 years, the shares and the dividends will be moved to the Investor Education and Protection Fund (IEPF).

This is something that a lot of our parents are facing and I thought we should have a thread on this since information on this is completely lacking.

Since most of the folks in the range of 50-60 years will not be knowing how to do this, they get ripped of through some brokers/lawyers who demand a huge sum for getting this done which is almost equal to the price of these shares.

To claim back the same the form(Form - 5 ) and the steps are given in the link below:

http://www.iepf.gov.in/IEPFA/corporates.html

But the question here is how does one calculate the bonus shares and the total unpaid dividends for a period of say 10 or more years?

Or does the claimant only have to enter the initial number of shares and the unpaid dividends and the bonus shares etc will be recalculated by the company or are these lost ?

Thank you in advance for any advice.

@Admins, I completely understand if this question is deleted Thank you.

[vikas_sinha]

I have been processing such claims for past few months, for some old relatives.
In most cases you can find the information about shares and dividends moved to IEPF, on the company website.
In cases I handled, the depository statement showed the number of shares moved.
I did not bother to look up the dividend amounts, mostly they are negligible. Also, the IEPF claims form allows you to leave this part blank. That does make sense, since they are asking for information already known to them.
Of course the reclaim procedure is a load of sarkari BS, very repetitive.
The only root cause is dividend left unclaimed, for past 7 years, due to lack of ECS to bank account of holder.
It should be a one-click procedure to do eKYC etc and link bank account to a demat account.
Problem solved! Well but apparently there are plenty of people who need jobs such as processing dumb IEPF claims

So far, NIIT has rejected claim which is due to Rs 30 dividend (I omitted) and they have spent Rs 300 in sending documents back and forth and also time discussing the matter of Rs 30, now ended in dead-lock due to ill-designed IEPF form!

ICICI Bank and HT Media had zero issues with the same claims. They forwarded the claims to IEPF. IEPF has responded with some minor corrections to be done by ICICI Bank, they copied the mail to me. The claims took 3 months before reaching the Sarkar. It might take a few months before refunds from IEPF.

ONGC, JP Associates, IndiaBulls HF, PowerGrid, all sent back the exact same forms with corrections. Some helpfully marked in pencil. Mostly asking to include dividend amount or attest each page etc. (I forget that). In case of ONGC to include the full company name! One of them wanted a notarized Indemnity Bond, another wanted a higher value indemnity bond of Rs 500 (a grey zone, the value depends upon the state you are in).

Just reminds me, there is a sucker born every minute, who wants a job, quite frequently it seems in the company legal/secretarial department.

I am not sure why linking a bank to a demat account is not a one time procedure. Maybe one of SEBI, NSE or CDSL or some other Sarkari BS ministry or company knows.

In the cases I handled, some dim-witted broker handles the paperwork related to CDSL, and the people are not aware of the procedure. CDSL has an extreme sexy and user friendly website, which I am unable to handle

Mostly now these people have started taking mails received from companies seriously. Most companies inform in advance about shares liable to be moved to IEPF. They then promptly sell these shares (using a DIS slip ). These warning letters also ask for a cancelled cheque and PAN and Address proofs (attested). But I find that trusting them to do the linking might be doubtful. You can take the chance if dearly attached to the shares.

[vishwa.bhat19]

Hi Vikas,

Thanks a lot for not collapsing my question and for your reply

I am still a bit confused about the bonus shares. Since the dividends are negligible and there is no chance of calculating and getting back the same we can ignore them. But what about the bonus/splits etc? Are these lost too ?

[vikas_sinha]

Yes, bonus/splits, all shares may also get lost, but they do not get moved to IEPF at the same time as the original purchased shares. This is because the 7 year rule applies to them also, but only from the time since the bonus/split shares got credited to your account. Usually this date is much later and at different points in time. So they mostly do survive, but depends on the timeline.

[Leading_Nowhere]

Hi Vikas

I am doing this for my father to reclaim shares as well as dividend. I had a couple of questions -:

1. The IEPF 5 requires you to state the amounts in INR claimed. In this, how do i denote the amount of shares in INR? There is no specific field for this either, I have to put it in “others”. Do I specify the nominal value of shares? For example, 1000 shares of INR 2 each, so amount claimed will be INR 2000?

2. The help PDF for IPEF 5 says put claims for only one FY in one form, but you can put multiple claims. My demat has told me that dividend for 3 years has been credited to IEPF along with the shares. Dividend pertains to 2009, 2010 and 2011 but shares were moved in November 2017. Will all of this come in 1 form or will i have to prepare 4 different forms?

Would appreciate some guidance on this.

Thank you.

[vikas_sinha]

Sorry for delay! I replied immediately via mail response but there was some error and it did not get posted.

1. Nominal Value (FV), Mr Market is not involved here
2. 1 form for all shares.

Most companies add back the dividend, very helpfully. No shares are lost, Bonuses and Splits are all given back to the owner.
For my relatives, I applied to 6 companies. Only NIIT is being very unhelpful and blocked the application.
Rest 4 PowerGrid, ONGC, etc. responded with some minor corrections, mostly forcing to specify the dividend amount.
ICICI had no corrections.
All forms were filled in a totally identical manner.
ICICI and ONGC have been rightfully returned to my relatives from IEPF!
Indiabulls housing have been sent some corrections by IEPF, they always copy mails to the original applicant.
One was processed with Bihar Stamp papers worth Rs. 2000 and other one with Delhi Stamp papers worth Rs. 200.

This as per feedback of IEPF (Min of Corp Affairs)!

[vikas_sinha]

I am uploading here the complete IEPF form, filled in, along with the 3 page letter from NIIT demanding corrections. Usually these corrections are not done for other (already accepted and shares returned) forms.
NOTES:

1. The unnecessary corrections is: Notarization of the Indemnity bond pages, already printed on Stamp paper.
2. Indemnity bond can be on plain paper if value of claim is < Rs. 10,000.
3. In claim value, I only fill in the face value of share, not the current market price. I also exclude the dividend amount as it can be difficult to find out (some companies put this info on their website).
4. In “FORM NO. IEPF-5” Section 2, you only need to fill in the CIN and click on “pre-fill”. Just google for CIN of the company.
5. A cancelled cheque (of the bank account with name of account holder printed) is also attached but not shown by me.
6. In “FORM NO. IEPF-5” page 3 (of 4) a sign is required. Rest only the KYC docs need self-attestation, i.e., PAN and Aadhaar copies. To be on safer side we attested more docs also.
7. We could not get stamp papers in Bihar, so I ordered some from Delhi. This is not quite correct. Rs. 100 was just a round and low figure.

I HAVE SUFFICIENTLY ANONYMIZED INFO UPLOADED HERE REQUIRED FOR SAFETY. LET IT BE PUBLIC.
warning: Order of upload is bit mixed up.

[vikas_sinha]

ICICI claim was little over Rs. 1 Lakh hence the bigger denomination stamp papers. I have no interest in the stamp act of 1811 b***dy bureaucrats and s***ty ministers

[lekha]

Hello Sir Greetings!

I have a unclaimed bond matured in 2004 , the concerned finance company asked to file IEPF 5 .

1. Got a rejection and received an email
   Email as follows …
   Dear Sir/ Madam,

This is to inform you that in terms of Rule 10 of the Companies (Registration Offices and Fees) Rules, 2014, the
above-cited Form IEPF-5 dated 10/12/2019 filed by THE PEERLESS GENERAL FINANCE & INVESTMENT CO LTD vide SRN has been examined and marked as Sent for resubmission with the following remarks-
The defects or incompleteness in any respect in this eForm as noticed by the Registrar have been placed on the
Ministry website ( www.mca.gov.in). In view of the above, you are therefore, directed that this eForm should be
resubmitted complete in all respects failing which the eForm shall be treated as invalid and shall
not be taken on record or transaction shall be cancelled.

++++++++++++++++++++++This is on the website+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"In term of the provisions of Rule 10 of The Companies (Registration offices and Fees) Rules, 2014 and Rule 36(8) of the LLP Rules, 2009, there is a restriction on the opportunity given for furnishing information or for rectification of the defects or incompleteness. Please ensure that the resubmission being done is complete in all respects. Are you sure that you want to resubmit this eForm?
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I have read in regards to the Rule 10 , it points to Name and email of the company did it get rejected because of the incorrect Either Name or email while filling up the form.
Or it could be any other field?

2. Also i have checked in regards to the Indemnity bond on earlier thread , Came to know it has to be on bond paper with a notary. I had submitted bond on plain paper (value is greater than 10k and below 20k).Could this be the cause too.

Could you please provide email ID @vikas_sinha

[vikas_sinha]

The entire rejected form is usually sent back with annotations and a letter attached which lists reasons for rejection. Keep making corrections and send back the form. Yes, several forms have been rejected for wrong name and wrong denomination stamp paper. Like spelling out ONGC is required, missing LTD can also be cause, it depends on the company legal/CS department, what kind of idiots there are. Exact same form has been OK and also rejected!

You can always DM/mail me on this forum id itself.

[lekha]

@vikas_sinha. Thank you very much for getting back !.

1. The original copies etc was emailed to the company and acc. to them it was sent to IEPF .
   So the entire form would be sent back to the company or to us for correction or re-submission.

2. Where can we check the annotations or letter (by any chance on the IEPF portal after login).

3. How would we know the amount of the Indemnity bond , (accordingly to stampact of India).Could you help with it .

I am unable to message or email to you individually, have just signed up think might have been granted access. or otherwise apologize for my ignorance for not knowing.

[vikas_sinha]

I have messaged you @Lekha, you can reply to that. Maybe the info here can help someone else!

Some of my failures occurred in the first stage, the company itself scrutinized the forms and rejected them. But if I recall correctly (IIRC) (it has been little over a year since I did this) some were returned by the IEPF back to the company. In the end, it is the responsibility of the company to forward the documents back to you.
Yes, entire form is sent back, I just changed the pages requiring corrections, IIRC!

No, the portal, was only used to get the forms uploaded (and then printed) in the first place and get an ack number and receipt page. Which was useless since the whole (REAL process) was by paper-trail and was a duplication anyway.

Yes, the stamp act of India is a black-hole, could not find much info on it, max denominations I used were Rs 500 (IIRC). Most were accepted with Rs 50 denomination also, basically anything goes till an idiot tries to get officious.

[kalavathi5309]

Is there any website where you can find shares in your name that are currently with IEPF ? IEPF portal has a link but it never works.

[ashwind]

@kalavathi5309

shares

Have you searched at http://www.iepf.gov.in/IEPFWebProject/SearchInvestorAction.do, this should be helpful, i hope.

[kalavathi5309]

Ashwin

I have searched this link in the past and recently. The link doesnt give results and hence submitted a ticket as well.

Thanks

Kalavathi

[CGJoseph]

Hello. I am trying to get some shares legally transmitted as well as refunded from the iepf.

A lot of posts talk about how it takes a lot of time. What’s the average duration it takes for such claims, ie involving transmission to legal heir as well as refund.

[ashwind]

Do note this is my experience, 18 months.

There are 3 parties involved, 1)IEPF, 2) Company itself, 3) The Claimant. Claimant needs to submits all documents to Company after creating a SR on the MCA/IEPF website. Company takes its time to do verifications, and documentation from its end, before forwarding it to IEPF. If anything gets returned due to SIgnature mismatch, wrong stamp paper amount, incorrect address, other hundred things, etc then it takes atleast 6-8 weeks to get the papers back to IEPF.

In my case (actually my Uncles) it took 18 months, since the forms had to sent back 3 times I could not followup regularly and if i forgot that was it. They can make this process better, but it is what it is on ground. All the Best. Not worth it if you are going to claim less then 2-3KRs.

[CGJoseph]

Thank you so much @AshwinDSouza for your reply. The process seems a bit convoluted. If you could help out with any of these, itd be great.

1. I seem to be getting contradictory statements reg the stamp paper value. Is it dependent on the Face Value or the Market value?
2. Does it matter if the indemnity bond is executed in a state other than the state of permanent residence?
3. Some companies have not given me any format for the NOC for other legal heirs. Do I just go ahead and send the documents without that?
4. My father was holding the shares in physical form at the time of his death. The shares were then dematerialised before being credited to the IEPF. Does the type of holding remain physical or become demat?

Could you also please list what were the corrections you had to do, so that I could avoid those errors? A previous post has very helpfully mentioned that the company names should be in full, all pages attested and the like. Any pointers like those?

[ashwind]

I will caution against copying the process since every company is following a slightly different variation of the verification process, criteria for processing forms. You might have seen different people respond in different manners for different companies in this thread itself.

To be sure you follow the company specific requirements, I would suggest to write a formal letter with the questions (ones noted by you for stamp paper, etc) you have, the scenario that you are facing, and send it to the Company Secretary / Registrar through Registered Post. Based on their reply & directions, to proceed.

Unfortunately there is no streamlined process, but with time and patience, and following company instructions it can be completed.

Thanks,
Ashwin.

[CGJoseph]

Thank you. Tbh my confusion was because different companies had different requirements. And I was under the impression that it was supposed to be same for all, so was uncertain whether I was missing something. I guess I’ll just attach the documents each company has specified