How to Claim Shares and Dividends Stuck in the IEPF: A Complete Guide

Here is a rule most investing families do not know: if the dividends on a share go unclaimed for seven consecutive years, the law does not just park the dividends. The shares themselves are transferred out of the investor’s name into the government’s Investor Education and Protection Fund (IEPF).

This is how a grandfather’s Infosys or Reliance holding quietly disappears from the family’s radar: dividends stopped reaching an old address, seven years passed, and the shares moved to the IEPF. The good news: nothing is lost. The rightful owner, or their legal heirs, can claim the shares and every accumulated dividend back, at any time, for free. The honest news: this is the slowest and most paperwork-heavy of all recovery processes, which is exactly why an industry of agents charges 5 to 15 percent of the recovered value to do it. This guide is so you can do it yourself.

Free tool. Answer five questions and get a personalised claim plan with the letters written for you: open the Recovery Navigator.

Step 1: Confirm what the IEPF holds

1. Use the search facility on iepf.gov.in to look up the investor’s name and the company.
2. Cross-check on the company’s website: listed companies must publish lists of shares and dividends transferred to the IEPF, usually under the Investor Relations section.
3. Old paper trails help enormously: share certificates, dividend warrants, demat statements, or letters from registrars (RTAs) found in family files.

Note the company name, folio number or demat details, and roughly how many shares are involved. Each company requires its own claim.

Important. Only one IEPF-5 claim per company per folio can be in process at a time, and a rejected claim means starting over. It pays to file once, completely and correctly, rather than fast.

Step 2: What you need before filing

If the original investor has passed away, add: death certificate, and the transmission documents. Where the shares were held jointly or a nominee exists, the path is simpler; where not, you will need legal heir proof, and for larger holdings a succession certificate or probate. The company’s registrar will usually require the transmission of shares to be processed alongside or before the IEPF claim. Read our succession versus legal heir guide for that half.

Step 3: File webform IEPF-5

1. Register or log in on the MCA portal (mca.gov.in, the V3 system) and open webform IEPF-5.
2. Fill the claimant’s details, the company, the folio or demat details, the shares and amounts claimed, and the Aadhaar-linked bank account.
3. Submit online. An SRN (Service Request Number) is generated. Save it; it is your tracking ID for everything that follows.
4. Download and print the filled form.

Step 4: Send the physical file to the company

Post one envelope to the Nodal Officer (IEPF) at the company’s registered office, marked “Claim for refund from IEPF Authority”, containing:

• The printed, signed IEPF-5 form with the SRN
• The indemnity bond and advance receipt in original
• Self-attested copies of every proof, and the cancelled cheque
• For heirs: the death, transmission and heirship documents

Then go back to the MCA portal and update the postal receipt details against your SRN under the pending-action tab, which moves the claim into processing. Keep photocopies of the entire file.

Step 5: Verification and payout

1. The company verifies your claim and sends its verification report to the IEPF Authority. The rules give companies 30 days for this.
2. The IEPF Authority examines the claim, may raise clarifications (answer them fast; delays reset queues), and approves.
3. Shares are credited to your demat account, and dividends and other amounts to the bank account, after approval.

The honest timeline

On paper, the process reads like 60 to 90 days. In reality, claims filed recently have averaged many months, with independent analyses in 2025 putting the average near 21 months end to end. The rules were amended again in October 2025 to streamline parts of the process, and government pressure to clear backlogs is rising, but plan for a long campaign, not a sprint:

Tip. Follow up in writing with the company’s nodal officer monthly (their email must be published on the company website), track your SRN on the MCA portal, and escalate long-pending claims to the IEPF Authority through its grievance channels. Persistence measurably shortens the wait.

Why claims get rejected

• Mismatched names across PAN, Aadhaar, the old folio and bank records, without affidavits explaining them.
• Missing originals of the indemnity bond or advance receipt.
• Entitlement not established: no certificates, folio numbers or RTA confirmation.
• Filing before the transmission of a deceased investor’s shares is sorted.
• A second claim filed while one is pending.

The checklist to save

• Search iepf.gov.in and the company’s IEPF lists; note every company and folio.
• Open a demat account in the claimant’s name and link Aadhaar to the bank account.
• Collect entitlement proofs and, for heirs, the legal documents.
• File IEPF-5 online, note the SRN, and post the file to the nodal officer.
• Update the postal receipt on the portal, then follow up monthly in writing.
• Do it yourself before paying an agent 5 to 15 percent; the process is tedious, not impossible.

The moral of the seven years

Every share in the IEPF got there the same way: an address nobody updated, a dividend nobody banked, a holding nobody told the family about. Seven years of silence, and the law moved the shares. Parampara exists so the silence never starts: every folio, demat account and nominee, written down in a vault only your family can open.