OCBC 360 interests changes again (Apr 2016)

Previously, I posted about the OCBC360 account and its interest revision in May 2015
http://madstranger.blogspot.sg/search/label/OCBC360

Currently, the account has the following interest components:

If we ignore the "invest" component, most account holders can still earn an interest of 2.2% on the first 60k in the OCBC 360 savings account. In addition to this, you also earn an interest of 1% for any incremental balances.

Starting from April 2016, there will be some changes to the interest components. The changes are as follows:

The most important change is the bonus interest can be earned on the first 70k instead of the current 60k.

Other changes are as follows:

1) Payment component:
The interest has been revised from 0.5% to 0.3%
There is now a minimum of $150 for the 3 bills. Previously there is no minimum total to fulfill. There were account holders who paid 3 $1 to 3 different credit cards. They can no longer use this trick.


2) Credit card spending component:
The interest has been revised from 0.5% to 0.3%

3) Invest component:
The interest has been revised from 1% to 1.2%. Also, an additional lower tier has been introduced.

 

 Most people won't qualify this interest component unless they invest with OCBC.

4) Savings component:

There will no longer be bonus interest paid on incremental bonus.

Instead, an additional 1% is earned on the first 70k if you have at least 200k in the OCBC 360 account. This also works out to be a 0.35% across the 200k.

For most people, they will be earning lesser interest.

Comparison between the interests now and the revised interests:

		Average interest per month
	Interest	Now	Interest	Apr-17
Base		60000		70000
Salary	1.2	60	1.2	70
3 bill	0.5	25	0.3	17.5
credit card	0.5	25	0.3	17.5
incremental bonus on 1k	1	0.83		0
TOTAL		110.83		105

Assuming you have 70k in the account, you now earn $5 lesser bonus interest per month on average.

In addition to this, you lose out on he incremental balance interest. For every $1000 of incremental bonus, you get $0.83 lesser on average per month.

However, if you have a full 200k sitting inside the account, you will qualify for the "save bonus interest" and will get an additional $58.33 on average

  

Conclusion:

For some who have larger savings with the bank or do investment with the bank, they can gain more interests.

However, for most people, they will be earning lesser interests from 2.2% to 1.8%. Some have already started looking at alternatives like UOB ONE, BOC smart saver and Citibank maxigain accounts.

OCBC360 interest rates revision Part 2

The OCBC 360 changes are announced.

 Changes include:
1) "credit your salary" bonus interest increased from 1% to 1.2%
2) "pay 3 bill" bonus interest decreased from 1% to 0.5%
3) "Spend on credit card" bonus interest decreased from 1% to 0.5%
4) "Spend on credit card" bonus interest spending criteria increased from $400 to $500
5) new bonus interest: "insure or invest" bonus interest. To qualify, you must "purchase any new eligible financial product from OCBC of at least the minimum amount, such as Endowment of at least S$8,000 in annual premium, or investment products such as Unit Trust or Structured Deposits of at least S$40,000."
6) bonus interests now applies to the first 60k instead of 50k
7) additional 1% on incremental balances. Incremental account balance is the difference between current and previous month's account average daily balance.This bonus interest will be paid on incremental account balance of up to S$1,000,000.


Other thoughts:
On the whole, I feel it is harder to earn the bonus interest. I am not interested to invest nor insure with OCBC. So the new 1% is out. For the credit card bonus, it makes it harder to qualify and the bonus interest is reduced. Also, UOB seem to be offering a better deal on this.

We will not be able to get much out of the additional interest on the "incremental balances". Unless we find another similar scheme and start transferring  additional balances to and fro on alternate months to earn the bonus on alternate months.

OCBC360 interest rates revision Part 1

Last year, I blogged on how the OCBC360 account can earn you 3.05% per annum.
http://madstranger.blogspot.sg/2014/04/earn-up-to-305-in-interest-with-ocbc-360.html

Recently, OCBC announced some changes on the revision of interest rates on the account. The details are as follows

Screenshot extracted from: http://www.ocbc.com.sg/personal-banking/notices.html

My thoughts:
The 3 bill payment and credit card bonus interest are reduced from 1% to 0.5%. Not only that, the credit card minimum spend criteria has increased from $400 to $500. This makes it harder to meet the criteria.

OCBC mentioned that there will be 2 new ways to earn bonus interests but did not provide details at this point. I suspect the 2 new ways plus the existing 3 ways are likely to give the same 3% bonus interest. If this is so, it makes it harder for us to hit the full 3% bonus interest. We need to hit 5 criteria instead o the current 3.

With the Singapore Saving Bonds (SSB) releasing in the 2nd half of the year, many people will shift their money to the SSB if the OCBC360's bonus interest are no longer attractive. Will OCBC reduce their bonus interest rates at this juncture? We will know once the details of the 2 new bonus interests are released.