Hi all,

I self-contributed to EPF a few days ago (in year 2020) but the money did not appear in my account after 2-3 days. In fact, upon login to i-akuan, only my account balance till 31 Dec 2019 appears.

If I click on the My Account tab, the contribution for 2020 is unavailable.

Can anyone who contributed early this year confirm this? Thanks

Thanks, I can confirm that is the right amount. Makes me wonder why EPF don't update the main page figures immediately but only the figures buried after accessing a few tabs and buttons.

Thanks for replying me at 4 a.m. in the morning.


Precious info. Thanks a lot. So, it will be better to deposit (self-contribute) towards the end of the month rather than at the beginning since I can park my money in a money market fund to earn extra interest, right?

This post has been edited by TOS: Jan 31 2020, 11:38 PM

But if this is the case, wouldn't EPF expect sudden surge in inflow of cash towards the end of the month? If they want to make their cash flow smoother, I guess a daily accrued compounding interest dividend calculation would help. That way, people would contribute only when they feel they have to but not "stockpile" the cash and only release them to EPF at the end of the month.

Maybe the calculation is too tedious for them.

So, for ASNB FP fund it is the first day of each month for extra one month dividend, whereas for EPF it is towards the end of the month. Well timing indeed.

Ah yes, right. Thanks for the clarification.

Yes, I self-contribute under the i-saraan scheme. You can read up on the different ways to self-contribute at the link below.

https://www.kwsp.gov.my/en/member/contribution/i-saraan

i-saraan was meant for those who are self-employeed, including freelancer. One of the main perks is the 15% bonus (up to 250 MYR) given by the government till 2022 for those who contributed under the i-saraan scheme.

As for other ways to self-contribute, I can think of PRS (Private Retirement Schemes) and your own investment across various asset classes through different means such as unit trusts, ASNB fixed price funds, or direct exposure to stock, bonds or derivative products. Other gurus will be able to provide more info on the relevant investment products available out there.

I, on the other hand, got more money than calculated using the EPF calculator! So, sent an email to them to ask for correct computations of dividend.

Ok, KLCI dropped more than 40 points now, below 1490.

This post has been edited by TOS: Feb 24 2020, 02:49 PM

For dividend calculations, I suspect that the calculations of dividends for i-saraan members are different from those calculated through online calculators. Not sure if you can verify this, but I have emailed EPF this afternoon to ask for a detailed explanation of dividend calculations.

By the way, "Like if I deposit 5th Mar, I will only get dividend from April onwards etc." this is indeed what online EPF calculators do, and I also get the same answer when I calculate according to this formula manually. But for my case, I got more dividend instead.

As for days to wait till it takes effect, I think it is not as long as 5-6 working days. For my case, if memory serves, it can be done within 24 hours (just wait for the system to update overnight). Actually, just contribute 1667 will do, no need to contribute more than that amount if your aim is the 250 government incentive.

3 year 750 is worthwhile for me, after deducting transportation cost, and some waiting time to subscribe to i-saraan. (Maybe my house is near to an EPF office.)

Any thoughts on the i-saraan matching grant for EPF?

I guess there should be a limit to it, otherwise if someone deposited several thousands, the government will have to fork out a huge sum for everyone.

But no information on the limit though?

So, you are saying that the 15% contribution up to 250 by the government is the matching grant?

I beg to differ.

If that's the case, the announcement by the PM yesterday is utterly useless. i-saraan scheme was launched back in 2018/2019 and the 15% incentive is already known to the public for quite some time. There must be some differences between the matching grant incentive announced yesterday and the original government incentive then, I hope?

After all, matching grant should be based on employee's contribution (with a factor of 1 to 1), completely unrelated to the 15% incentive.

Appreciate that. Yes I am referring to that announcement. But I am trying to understand how this new "matching grant" is different from the 15% incentive earlier. No details are released except the total amount is 50 million. Both Grumpy and you are directing me to the original 15% incentive by the government which I am fully aware of.

What I want to know is how this new "matching grant" is different from the old/original 15% incentive? Or are they the same thing (in which case, the announcement yesterday is useless.)?

This post has been edited by TOS: Jun 6 2020, 10:12 AM

Ah, useless to me, but useful for gig workers. Got it!

This post has been edited by TOS: Jun 6 2020, 10:19 AM

https://www.kwsp.gov.my/-/epf-supports-budg...irement-savings

Now i-Saraan extended to include those age 55-60.

https://www.kwsp.gov.my/member/contribution/i-saraan

Yes, she is qualified if below 60 (from next year) or below 55 (from this year). The age has been extended from 55 to 60 in Budget 2022 (website still says below age 55, not yet updated).

No check on household income, I opened my EPF i-saraan account when I was in high school. No income proof needed.

https://www.sinchew.com.my/20220327/%e6%bb%...b4%be%e6%81%af/

As long as you are 16 years old, you can open an EPF account to deposit up to 60k MYR a year and enjoy diviends. However, your money can only be withdrawn at the age of 55 or if you meet EPF's withdrawal criteria.

EPF "doesn't care where the funds come from".

Why not? An M40 family children should be able to start with say 20-50 ringgits every 1-3 months for example. (I started with a few hundred ringgits from angpow money.) You can even start with a few ringgits, RM 5 or RM 10 monthly maybe.

I think it is a very good tool to educate the younger generations on financial management. Teach them how to invest and grow your money. Also a very good tool to teach them on liquidity, e.g. "You get higher returns versus bank deposits partly because it's harder to take out". (My mother teaches me FD, and I moved into EPF myself after acquiring the neccesary knowledge).

Also if you are eligible for i-saraan (pretty much every youngsters is eligible, I just told the EPF office I help my mother do household chores... so some money come in, then straightaway you are eligible for i-saraan and not just the conventional voluntary contribution). You deposit money (up to a maximum of 1667 annually if you have it), and enjoy the (up to maximum 250 ringgit) 15% payout from the government plus around 5-6% dividend annually till the i-saraan scheme ends.

If you count, your annual returns are in excess of 20% p.a. (government incentive is counted as part of the returns). Where else in Malaysia do you enjoy such returns? (When you start working, assuming a regular paid job, you won't be eligible for i-saraan.)

I think this is a super-cool "product" to grow a youngster's money and an educationtal tool at the same time. It teaches me a lot on finance and financial management in particular.

Or maybe just me.

This post has been edited by TOS: Mar 28 2022, 01:37 AM

A few ringgit as starting point with MGS and GII plus 30% in overseas investments still ok lah

Chief among them is over-concentration of portfolio in MYR-denominated assets. About 3/4 of EPF assets are in MY.

And also concentration issues on asset allocation too. About 1/4 of EPF assets are in federal government debt.

And then you have macro factor like currency matters, e.g. MYR's performance, low current account surplus, insufficient savings rate etc. Just to name a few.

That's fair. In the worst case, BNM can just print money to top up your EPF (in fact they are already doing that now, but to fund government expenses via EPF as middleman, according to local fund manager source whom I should not quote). I was just pointing out some of the possible issues.

And err, 2.5% p.a. minimum has strings attached it, if you read the act carefully.

https://www.kwsp.gov.my/en/about-epf/news-h...es/epf-act-1991



Just make sure you care about real returns, not nominal ones. Purchasing power is important.

Bro, how can you make this mistake as well? You are sifu ooo... Past results are no indicator of future performance.

Your kiasu kiasi friend has a different idea. Their GIC invests worldwide and diversify CPF holder's investments across different classes and have different currencies exposure.

https://www.gic.com.sg/our-portfolio/

https://report.gic.com.sg/investment-report.html

And that is despite the fact that SGD has to appreciate over the long run due to MAS monetary policy. So getting dividends/realized capital gains back to SG will incur some 2% p.a. loses over time depending on how steep S$NEER curve rises.

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Depending on how you see it, risk to EPF is less if you look at nominal terms, since BNM can just print MYR to cover up the hole. But in real terms, this action will cause MYR to lose its value significantly. Your purchasing power evaporates. Your MYR "stored" in your EPF account can then "buy nothing". I don't think that's what a retiree expect when he withdraws his "retirement savings".

Always remember, it's real returns that matter in the end. You want your purchasing power to be protected throughout your working ages and possibly earn a risk premium on top of that with risk assets in a well-diversified portfolio.

lol UK pension funds that are affected by LDI are mostly defined benefit plans. EPF doesn't have defined benefit plans (ours is called defined contribution plan, you contribute a portion of your salary to your pensions). I don't think EPF has used LDI strategy as of now unless the government starts to shift to some form of minimum payout guaranteed which carries some elements of defined benefit at its minmum.

In fact, the LDI crisis in the UK illustrates what happened when funds hold lots of government treasury bills, notes or bonds in its portfolio. A surging government bond yields force the pension funds to top up their collateral against their LDI counterparty, but they don't have so much cash in a matter of few hours, which in turns means they have to liquidate more gilts to bring down the margin, causing more funds to sell even more gilts to fulfill their collateral/margin requirements. Imagine 1/4 of MGS/GII issued held in the hands of EPF and if EPF has to do this...

Hope that helps.

I can see that you really like Malaysia a lot and is a strong supporter of MY's pension system. EPF is actually a good vehicle judging by the system as it allows for lots of flexibility (compared to the stupid HK MPF system...), but well, no match to my favourite CPF

I respect your view anyway, you got some valid points there.

This post has been edited by TOS: Oct 12 2022, 05:19 PM