CPF Time Deposit by OCBC bank, 8-months Fix Deposit, 3.88% per annum!

CPF refused to raise the CPF interest? No problem!

We just placed two CPF Time Deposit with OCBC today, 8 months tenure, 3.88% p.a., total S$251,000 from CPF OA account. Hence must take a nice screenshot for remembrance before the monies are sucked out from CPF OA account to OCBC bank. You must leave at least S$20,000 balance in CPF OA account + some buffers, just in case you have any OA deduction for “any matters”.

Take 3.88% p.a. fix deposit rate from OCBC bank to beat CPF OA interest of 2.50% p.a.!

The queue is damn long. I took the queue number at 11.13 a.m. and only completed at 3.16 p.m. (4 hours duration). The experienced OCBC staff was kind enough to inform you that it will be more than 2 hours wait. Of course, we were not waiting there. We left the place after taking the queue number and went back at 2.30 p.m. again. Do not wait there blindly and get frustrated for nothing. It took such a long time to clear the queue numbers because many do not have CPF investment account, and they have to complete the questionnaires and set up the CPF investment account on the spot with OCBC bank. When it’s our turn, as I have the CPF investment account with DBS, the whole transaction was fast 💨, like 3 minutes?

Now, we just wait for few more days (hopefully less than 10 business days) to see the monies to be deducted from CPF OA account and a time deposit certificate shall be mailed to our doorstep.

Updated on February 20th, 2023: 

Let's look at the timeline below.

(1) February 11th (Saturday), 3.00 P.M., both FDs application submitted.

(2) OCBC CPFIS account is slightly faster than DBS CPFIS account as this FD is offered by OCBC!

The CPF deduction happened on February 13th (Monday), and FD maturity date is October 14th.

(3) DBS CPFIS account is reasonably fast too.

The CPF deduction happened on February 14th (Tuesday), and FD maturity date is October 16th.

In conclusion, OCBC CPFIS is faster than DBS CPFIS account by 2 business days.

There is a very timely article from The Straits Times on February 13th, 2023! 

By following the computation of OA interest rate formula, you will see NO CHANCE for the OA interest rate to increase.

“OA rate = 80% of the average of the local banks’ 1-year FD rate + 20% of the average of their saving rate.“ ✅

At today circumstances, it’s only 0.6633%, which is far below 2.50% rate. 

Hence, the government could have given us 0.67% instead of 2.50% rate! 😂😅

Want higher rate?
Go for T-bills or FD now!
No further discussion needed.

The Straits Times, April 3rd, 2023.