It depends...
IMHO:
IF you're looking at holistic and total costs for the long term (10 yrs and more), say EPF a/c1 funded investments, there is no 1 fund house in FSM that has both "slightly above average" equity funds AND bond funds. FSM has good equity funds & bond funds but IMHO, not within 1 fund house, thus cant do INTRA switching.
Thus, SWITCHING between INTER fund houses in FSM costs about 1% to 2%? Please correct me if i'm mistaken

(i actually hope i am, thus i've got another avenue for investments)
VS
Public Mutual's funds which have "slightly above average" equity funds AND bond funds, which one can switch to/fro for Asset Re-allocation (Tactical or Strategical) / Profit taking / etc.
Mind U, moving $50K, $100K, $200K, etc. several times within 10+ to 20+ years at $0 VS 1% to 2% makes a difference.
Thus, FSM just MAY not be "cheapest" in the long run in this perspective.
BTW, i'm assUme-ing investments via EPF lar, where most working stiff has the $ and doesnt affect "real" cash flow until retirement.
Thus, PM's cost is 3% (if one's one best customer-agent, cost is approximately 1.7%) for equity funds, not 5.5%
Just a thought and hope to be corrected, especially the cost of INTER switching costs for FSM

myself all my unit trust is from epf at the moment. but got some cash now. i think if the performance for FSM is about the same the pbmutual, then i can consider FSM because of lower sales charge. else, i think i might put into saving plan or FD.
what do you mean by "if one's one best customer-agent, cost is approximately 1.7%"? it is he is a pbmutual agent and if he buy unit trust, he only need to pay 1.7% sales charge?