IEPF Claim for Your Own Shares: The Simplest Case, Start to Finish

This is the most common and the fastest IEPF case: the shareholder is alive, the name on the folio matches the PAN, the address can be updated, and the original share certificates or folio details are available. If this is your situation, a well-prepared claim usually completes in four to seven months.

Step 1 — Confirm the holding

Search the MCA IEPF portal and the company's investor page using your name, PAN and folio number. Note the company CIN, exact folio, number of shares and the dividend years transferred. This list becomes the heart of your claim.

Step 2 — Fix your KYC before filing

Open or update a demat account in exactly the same name and name order as the folio. Get the Client Master List from your depository participant. Keep a cancelled cheque of a bank account linked to the same PAN. If your address has changed since the shares were bought, update it with the RTA first — a stale address is a common rejection reason.

Step 3 — File IEPF-5 and send the physical pack

File the IEPF-5 e-form on the MCA portal, download the acknowledgement, and courier the signed pack to the company's nodal officer: acknowledgement, indemnity bond on stamp paper, advance stamped receipt, original certificates, self-attested PAN and Aadhaar, CML and cancelled cheque.

Step 4 — Verification and credit

The company verifies the pack and files its verification report with the IEPF Authority. Once approved, shares are credited to your demat account and dividends to your bank. In a clean case there is usually one round of questions at most.

What can still go wrong

Even simple cases stall on small things: an unsigned indemnity bond, wrong stamp value, a signature that has changed over thirty years, or a demat account opened in a slightly different name. Checking each of these before filing is what separates a five-month claim from a fourteen-month one.

If your case is this simple, you can file it yourself using our step-by-step guide. If you would rather have it handled end to end, share your details below — we confirm eligibility free of charge and give a written quote before any work begins.