Opinion
Why no mention of CPF Life Basic Plan in TODAY’s interest absorption article?
Leong Sze Hian questions why Today’s piece on CPF Life missed discussing the Basic Plan, which diverges significantly from the Standard Plan by not absorbing post-age 65 interest into the pool upon death.
by Leong Sze Hian
Referring to the article published by Today on Thursday (29 Feb), which interviewed four experts on the subject of CPF Life, it aimed to explain why the accumulated interest after age 65 is absorbed into the CPF Life Pool upon a member’s death who is under the CPF Life Standard Plan.
The article references comments from Workers’ Party MP Louis Chua of the Sengkang Group Representation Constituency.
He cited CPF’s website, noting that when CPF members pass away, the interest earned on their CPF Life premiums is not included in the amount paid out to beneficiaries. This is because the premiums are risk-pooled—a fundamental concept behind annuity schemes—enabling members to receive regular lifetime payouts, even if they outlive their expected lifespan.
Mr Chua noted that this means although the Special Account and the Retirement Account have the same stated interest rate, the actual yield earned by the two accounts “could not be more different.”
One notable omission in the discussion from TODAY’s article is the lack of mention of the CPF Life Basic Plan option.
The CPF LIFE Basic Plan, a legacy option from when CPF LIFE was first introduced in 2009, offers a different approach.
Opting for this plan means approximately 80-90% of your Retirement Account (RA) savings are used to provide payouts until age 90. The remaining 10-20% is deducted as your CPF LIFE premium when you join, and is used to provide payouts from age 90 for the rest of your life.
Contrary to the CPF Standard Plan, which was extensively covered in the Today article, the Basic Plan does not involve the absorption of accumulated interest from the start date of monthly payouts (such as age 65 or 70) into the CPF Life Pool upon a member’s death.
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Got interest from YOUR money, they makan. Take your own money out to pay for slum HDB, got interest you got to pay back to CPF.
Sounds fair?
Yes.
To them.
Who did you dafties voted for?😆😆😆😆🤣🤣🤣
Insurance like CPF is a scam. The elites just want you to park money for them to use for investment or biz investment which is most probably their biz. Then can hold ppl money hostage by not returning unless you meet criteria. Hello the ppl money the ppl decide Not for you govt to decide based on your calculation for yourself.
If a citizens is in need, they surely exhaust everything they have first. Wat go loan from loan shark and be heavily indebted.
Then you there pretending white and tell them they cannot use their money.
Scam means scam!!!!!
They instill fear by stating that you will get less if you live too long with Basic Plan They instill fear by stating that your kids will get less too. Though both is fact, they dont mention the fact that you get to keep all the money which is yours… and interest too. They promote the Standard & Escalating Plan because they get to keep all interest that is earned. The money stays with them longer, which means they have more time to fiddle with it. The state does not want to be accountable for the citizen’s care and financing… Read more »