As a start, I would like to talk about this bank account which everyone is talking about, especially with their recent revision in the features.
For those who don't know about SmartSaver yet, it is a high interest savings account by Bank of China (at least for now).
It offers savers a high interest rate of 3.55% p.a., the highest possible interest rate in town, with just salary crediting of minimum S$2k, spending of S$500 per month using their debit and/or credit card (yes, payment through AXS is counted as well), and performing 3 bill payments. Most people could easily achieve these to earn the high interest rates. However, it is sad to see that they are revising their terms from 1 Dec.
From what we can see above, it seems like BOC has really done a great job in studying the market condition as well as their competitors. To me, I feel that they have tweaked the interest rates in such a nice way (to them) that it is not too low for people to close their accounts and transfer their money out, while not too high for them to feel the pressure in providing the interests in such a low interest rate environment. At the same time, they can even boost their credit cards spending and make it more sticky for their customers to stick with the bank. This is really Smart on their part, and I really have to congratulate them on this. Their management should be very proud of themselves.
I have been using this account for only a few months, and in retrospect, how I wish I have opened the account earlier so as to enjoy the high interest rates for the full year, and even probably receive the free $100 NETS Flashpay card. Anyway, it is too late to say anything now.
I would think that I will not be closing this account soon, due to the still-higher-than-average interest rates in the market. Let's just hope that there will be another interesting alternative to this account soon.
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