Switching jobs in Nepal: what happens to your PF, CIT, and SSF balance

A reader emailed last week. He'd quit his job at a finance company on the 30th of the previous month, joined a tech startup on the 1st, and was now staring at three separate questions he hadn't thought about during the resignation: what happens to my PF? My CIT? My SSF?

His old employer was on the Social Security Fund. The new one wasn't yet. His CIT was running on the side. His basic was Rs 80,000.

The honest answer wasn't a single line; it was three different stories playing out in three different institutions, each with its own rulebook. None of which the HR exit interview had walked him through.

The three buckets, briefly

A quick refresher before the switching mechanics. The full decision math sits in the CIT vs PF vs SSF post; this section is just enough vocabulary to follow the rest.

• Provident Fund (PF / EPF). Run by Karmachari Sanchaya Kosh. 10% from you, 10% matched by the employer, into an individual EPF account in your name. Interest declared annually (5.00% for FY 2082/83, per the latest rate notice). About Rs 500 billion of accumulated savings across roughly 6.28 lakh contributing members.
• Social Security Fund (SSF). 11% from you, 20% from the employer, totalling 31%. Bundles old-age pension (28.33% of the 31%), accident/disability (1.40%), medical/maternity (1.00%), and dependent family protection (0.27%). About 26.4 lakh contributors and 22,309 registered employers as of November 2025.
• Citizen Investment Trust (CIT). Voluntary. You choose what to contribute. Tax-deductible up to the combined retirement cap, with annually declared returns.

Your salary slip shows PF or SSF, never both. CIT can sit alongside either.

What happens to each bucket on the day you resign

The single most useful table in this post. Read it once, refer back to it whenever a job change is coming.

Bucket	The moment you resign	Default behaviour	What you actually need to do
PF (EPF)	Old employer stops contributing	Balance stays at EPF in your name, keeps earning interest	Give the new employer your EPF account number; they continue contributing into the same account
SSF	Old employer stops contributing; must notify SSF within 1 month	SSF ID and contribution history stay intact	Give the new employer your SSF ID; they resume contributions where the old one stopped
CIT	Payroll deduction stops if the new employer doesn't run CIT	Balance keeps earning interest; no auto-link to new payroll	Either ask new HR to add CIT to payroll, or set up direct top-ups yourself

Three different mechanics, all triggered on the same resignation date.

PF: the most common mistake is withdrawing it

The temptation on resignation day is real. Most Nepalis with PF balances at EPF have the technical right to apply for withdrawal when they leave a job. A few months of salary sitting there, accessible, with the words "lump sum" attached. It calls to you.

It is almost always the wrong move.

What that withdrawal costs you, beyond the actual rupees:

• The compounding window. Money pulled out at 32 is not money compounding at 5%+ for the next 28 years until you're 60. On a Rs 5,00,000 balance, leaving it for 28 years at 5% turns it into roughly Rs 19,50,000. Withdrawing it to fund a Bali trip costs you Rs 14,50,000 of future-you's money.
• The tax bite. Under Section 88 of the Income Tax Act 2058, the tax-free portion of an approved retirement payment is the higher of Rs 5,00,000 or 50% of the total deposit, with 5% TDS on the remainder. Withdraw a Rs 8,00,000 balance and you'll be paying 5% on Rs 3,00,000, or Rs 15,000 to IRD that you weren't going to pay if you'd left the money alone.
• The unwind problem. Once withdrawn, the balance doesn't go back. You'd have to start a fresh accumulation cycle with no head start.

The clean move: leave the PF balance at EPF. Give your new employer your existing EPF account number on day one of onboarding. Their contributions flow into the same account. Your statement on the EPF iPortal will show two employers contributing across the year, with the running balance compounding through the gap.

Practical hiccup to watch for: not every HR onboarding form asks for your existing EPF number. If yours doesn't, raise it proactively. The alternative is the new employer creating a fresh account in your name, which leaves you with two EPF accounts to reconcile later. Easier to head off in the first week than fix in the third year.

SSF: portable by design, but only if HR gets the ID right

SSF is the cleanest of the three on a job change, assuming both employers are SSF-enrolled.

The mechanics, in order:

1. Old employer stops monthly contributions and notifies SSF of your termination within one month. This is their legal duty, not yours.
2. Your SSF ID stays unchanged. Contribution history, accumulated balance, qualifying months toward the 180-month pension floor: all intact.
3. New employer registers you under your existing SSF ID and starts depositing 11% + 20% in the next payroll cycle.

What goes wrong in practice: the new employer's HR creates a fresh SSF registration because they didn't know you already had one. Now you have two SSF IDs, two parallel contribution histories, and a paperwork mess to merge later.

Avoid this by handing your SSF ID to the new HR on day one, in writing. Email or a signed form. Confirm in your first SSF payslip that the deduction lines up with your existing SSF portal balance after a month. The SSF Contributor Portal at sosys.ssf.gov.np is the source of truth; if your new contributions aren't showing under your ID after about 25 days post-month-end (the employers' deposit deadline), raise it then.

The other scenario worth naming: new employer isn't on SSF yet. Plenty of smaller private firms, especially startups, haven't enrolled. Your old SSF balance doesn't disappear; it sits in the fund and keeps earning return. But no new contributions flow in until you join an SSF-registered employer again. A stretch of years at non-SSF employers means a delay in hitting your 180-month qualifying horizon, not a forfeiture.

If the new employer is on PF instead of SSF, you'll have one of each: a frozen-but-earning SSF balance and a fresh PF account building up at the new job. Awkward but not broken. Keep both portal logins.

CIT: the silent break that nobody notices

CIT is the easiest to ignore on a job change, and that's exactly why people lose months of contributions to it.

Two paths CIT can take when you switch jobs:

• Old employer was deducting CIT through payroll. The deduction stops the day you leave. If your new employer doesn't run CIT through their payroll, your monthly contribution simply pauses. The balance keeps earning interest, but the SIP-like rhythm breaks.
• You set up CIT directly with your old employer and contributed via standing instruction. Same outcome from CIT's perspective; they don't know your employer changed unless you tell them.

The fix is mechanical. Either ask your new HR to set up CIT deduction through their payroll (and submit a written instruction to CIT confirming the new employer), or move to direct top-ups via the CIT portal or a manual deposit each month. Either works. What doesn't work is assuming CIT is portable in the same way SSF is. It isn't, because your contribution is your choice, not a statutory percentage tied to your employment.

The tax angle to remember: CIT contributions reduce your taxable income up to the combined retirement cap (lower of one-third of assessable income or roughly Rs 5,00,000 per year, subject to the current IRD circular). Three skipped months during a job transition is three months of foregone deduction. On a 20% marginal slab, that's real money. About Rs 5,000 of tax saving lost per Rs 25,000 of missed contribution.

The withdrawal rules are friendlier than SSF's. CIT's own FAQ confirms the Employee Savings Growth Retirement Fund slabs: up to Rs 5,00,000 withdrawn is tax-free, the Rs 5–10 lakh band is taxed at 5% on the amount above Rs 5,00,000, and above Rs 10,00,000 the 5% applies on 50% of the balance. Better than the PF/SSF tax math at the top end, which is one reason CIT often outperforms over a long horizon.

The tax math nobody tells you about

This deserves its own section because it's the most expensive thing people get wrong on resignation day.

The rule, in plain language: when you take an approved retirement payment (PF, CIT, or SSF lump-sum) out of the system, the higher of Rs 5,00,000 or 50% of the total deposit is tax-free under Section 88 of the Income Tax Act 2058. The rest is taxed at 5% TDS. For payments out of unapproved funds (purely employer-funded gratuity that isn't under an approved scheme, for instance), the rate jumps higher.

Three quick scenarios on a hypothetical Rs 12,00,000 PF balance:

Action	Tax-free portion	Taxable portion	TDS at 5%	Net in hand
Withdraw full balance on resignation	Rs 6,00,000 (50%)	Rs 6,00,000	Rs 30,000	Rs 11,70,000
Withdraw half, leave half	Rs 5,00,000 (the floor)	Rs 1,00,000	Rs 5,000	Rs 5,95,000 (of the Rs 6 lakh withdrawn)
Leave it all at EPF, withdraw nothing	N/A	N/A	Rs 0	Rs 12,00,000 compounding at 5%

The third row is the boring answer and usually the right one.

For SSF specifically: the pension portion isn't a withdrawable lump sum before 60 in the first place, so the tax question only really applies to the Retirement Fund slice (8.33%). For CIT, the slab structure cited above gives you slightly more headroom at the top end than the flat PF treatment.

When you're leaving Nepal, not just changing jobs

This is the other major trigger for cashing out, and the rules differ across the three buckets.

• PF (EPF). Permanent migration is grounds for full withdrawal. The accumulated balance plus interest is refundable. Practical paperwork: resignation letter, citizenship certificate, evidence of migration (employment letter abroad or visa), and bank details for the payout. Processing typically takes 2–4 weeks once the file is in.
• SSF. Only the Retirement Fund portion (the 8.33% gratuity-equivalent slice) is withdrawable on emigration. The pension portion stays locked. Full release of the pension balance requires a change of nationality, not just relocation. If you keep your Nepali passport, the pension money sits there until you turn 60.
• CIT. There is a published early refund path after 24 months of contributions if you can't continue due to job loss, permanent disability, or relocation abroad. Apply via the CIT portal with proof of the trigger and a Nepali bank account for the payout.

A common emigration sequence among Nepalis I've talked to: pull PF as a one-time lump sum to fund the move, leave SSF's pension portion behind to claim at 60, and decide about CIT based on how soon you'll be needing the money in your new country.

The post on returning from abroad covers the reverse direction. If you're going abroad and might come back, leaving the SSF pension intact has option value; your 180-month clock resumes if you ever rejoin an SSF-enrolled employer.

The three most expensive mistakes

In order of how often I see them:

1. Withdrawing PF on resignation because "I might as well." The tax bite is small but real. The compounding cost is large and invisible. Default to leaving the balance in place; only withdraw if you have a specific use for the money that beats the alternative.
2. Letting the new employer create a duplicate SSF ID. Hand them your existing SSF ID in writing on day one. Verify in the first month's payslip that the deduction goes to the right ID. Merging two SSF accounts later is doable but tedious.
3. Forgetting CIT exists during the transition. Three skipped months of CIT contributions is three months of missed tax deductions plus broken savings rhythm. Either set up a payroll deduction at the new employer or switch to direct top-ups before the second month.

A fourth, less common but more expensive: assuming SSF works like a fixed deposit. It doesn't. The pension portion is genuinely locked until 60. If you treat SSF like an FD you can break in an emergency, you'll find out the hard way that you can't.

Tracking the handover in Kharchapatra

The first month of a new job is the easiest time to clean up the accounts. A few specific moves:

• Tag the transition. Add a one-line note in your dashboard for the switch month ("Resigned ABC, joined XYZ"). Future you, looking at a year-on-year cashflow chart, will instantly understand why the deduction lines changed.
• Don't close the old PF/SSF account. Even if no new contributions are flowing in (because the new employer isn't enrolled, say), the balance is still yours and still growing. Keep the account visible.
• Open a new SSF or PF account if the scheme changed. If you went from a PF-only employer to an SSF employer, the legacy PF stays in its own account in the app; new SSF contributions go to a freshly named SSF account. Don't merge them. Keeping them separate makes the migration legible later.
• Treat CIT transition gaps as a budget question. If your CIT deduction stops for two months mid-transition, that's two months where your savings rate temporarily drops by your usual CIT percentage. Worth knowing, worth tracking.

What you actually need to know

Three things, in order:

1. Your PF and SSF balances are portable, not refunded. They sit in your name regardless of where you work. Treat them as long-term retirement money, not as a resignation bonus. The withdrawal route exists; the tax math and the compounding cost are why you should usually skip it.
2. The handover paperwork sits with you, not HR. EPF numbers and SSF IDs only follow you if you hand them over. Make the handover a written line on the joining-formalities checklist, not a verbal "I'll send it later."
3. CIT is the one you have to actively re-plumb. Unlike PF and SSF, CIT doesn't auto-resume at the new employer. Skipping it through a transition month is a small but compounding leak, both in saved tax and in retirement compounding.

If you're mid-switch and something in your handover looks wrong, like a missing EPF account on the new payslip, a duplicate SSF ID, or a CIT gap stretching past two months, email parjanya57@gmail.com with the line that looks off. Specific cases help future readers debug their own slips faster.

This post is part of the Nepal Money Basics guide — the retirement section.