Saving account that gives you monthly interest rate on par (or even better) than fixed deposit !
(Update: Standard Chartered has revised terms and conditions, interest from saving now stands at 0.95% and bonus interest from credit card spend is now 1.8%)
With the impact of COVID-19 pandemic, the economy across the globe is greatly impacted. Central bank around the world is lowering interest rate. As a result, interest you can receive from your saving account is also affected. In Malaysia, you can only get approximately 2% or lower interest from 12 months fixed deposit from banks. This article will show you how to maximize your interest earning using Privilege Saver saving account from Standard Chartered Bank.
Below is snapshot from official website of Standard Chartered Bank giving a brief summary of Privilege Saver saving account. Let’s talk about it.
As you can see from above, base interest is only 0.05%, which is extremely low. Don’t worry, this article will show you how to maximize your return using Privilege Saver saving account.
Step 1 – Deposit RM3000 of fresh fund every fund to earn additional 0.9% interest on saving account
Easiest way to achieve this step is to make this saving account as your salary account. In this case, as long as your net salary is more than RM3000, you are entitled to this addition 0.9% interest. And the good thing is the RM3000 deposited into the saving account does not get frozen. You are free to use this RM3000 in the Privilege Saver saving account for other purpose, such as paying your credit card bill.
If you do not have net salary of RM3000 to deposit as fresh fund, it is also a way to earn this additional 0.9% interest and it will be shown in later part of this article.
Step 2 – Spend at lest RM1000 using credit card from Standard Chartered Bank to earn additional 0.9% interest + minimum 5 transactions with debit card for another 0.9% interest
Don’t worry even if you don’t want to spend RM1000 using credit card from Standard Chartered Bank (you may already have your favorite credit card). However to satisfy step 2, you still must apply for a credit card from Standard Chartered Bank. And my recommendation is Just One Cash Rebate Mastercard.
Here is standard charted website link for credit card application. Standard Chartered is running a promotion until June 2021, you can have the following cashback by satisfying the conditions.
Step 3 – Spend RM1000 for unit trust through Standard Chartered Bank to earn additional 2% interest on saving account
If you are interested to invest in unit trust, you can explore step 3. Note that transaction fee of unit trust through Standard Chartered is higher than certain platform.
If you are not interested in unit trust investment, please skip step 3.
Step 4 – (Most Important Step !) Use in conjunction with BigPay or Touch’nGo e-wallet
BigPay is an e-wallet, which also gives a physical visa card. One special feature of BigPay compared to other e-wallet is, you can transfer money in the e-wallet to your bank account with merely RM0.50 transaction fee. However, please note that maximum amount of money you can transfer out from BigPay e-wallet is RM2000 every month and RM1000 every day. However it is more than enough for what will be introduced below.
Touch’nGo is another popular e-wallet in Malaysia, You can use credit card to top-up to Touch’nGo wallet, and transfer it within the apps to Touch’nGo Plus, which is a money market fund. From there, you can transfer your money out, without any charge.
Now is the point. First, use your Standard Chartered Bank credit card to top up RM2000 into your Big pay or Touch’nGO e-wallet every month. Subsequently you can transfer the money out from Big Pay / Touch’nGO to your bank account, then from your bank account to Privilege Saver saving account again.
If you already have at least RM3000 of net salary deposited into Privilege Saver saving account as fresh fund, you can skip this. Otherwise, you need to top up RM1000 into Privilege Saver saving saving account to meet conditions of step 1 to earn additional 0.9% interest.
You probably understand the trick now. Following instruction right above, you only need RM1000 of fresh fund to earn additional 0.9% interest from step 1. In addition, when you top up RM2000 into BigPay e-wallet with you Standard Chartered credit card, you fulfill condition in step 2 to entitle for further 0.9% of interest. Even if you are not investing unit trust as described in step 3, you still earn quite a decent 2.75% interest now, which is better than most of the fixed deposit.
To apply for BigPay, you can click here with referral code GXK7NWIZR1 so that you can have RM10 credit upon registration.
Additional Bonus! Just One Cash Rebate Mastercard treats E-wallet top-up as retail spending. Therefore, when RM2000 top-up is made on e-wallet with this credit card, you are entitled to higher tier of cash rebate as per schedule shown below. If you are willing to use this card for another RM500 of retail spending, you are entitled to 15% cash rebate on auto bill payment, online purchase and petrol, which is really awesome.
Here is standard charted website link for credit card application. Standard Chartered is running a promotion until June 2021, you can earn cash back for performing some transactions within 60 days.
Summary of the benefits
Interest from Privilege Saver saving account will be paid monthly. So unlike fixed deposit, you have flexibility with good interest rate. Without purchasing unit trust in step 3, it may not sound a lot for a 2.75% interest and there are a lot of investment method can make better return. However a good personal financing plan shall always include sufficient money to sustain your life in case of emergency, and this is a good place to keep your emergency fund. With the flexibility, you can always take out the money for other investment when opportunities arise, without losing your interest like in the case of premature withdrawal of fixed deposit.
We should be stingy and count every dollar while managing personal finance. A little money can grow substantially through snowball effect of compound interest.
Notes:
For additional interest introduced above, it is capped to maximum RM100,000 of your money in the saving account.
For official information on Privilege Saver saving account, please visit official website here.
