Monetary Auth of Singapore A dishonest practice by a bank?
Dear Mr. Tan

I wish to share this experience with my bank. I think that the bank is acting dishonestly.

I placed my fixed deposit with them a few years ago. The relationship manager advised me to set the fixed deposit to mature at the end of the term and to redeposit it at the rate at that time.

She advised me not to use the auto-renew feature as the auto-renewal is at the board rate, which is much lower than the rate for new deposits.

She also promised me that she would remind me about the renewal of the fixed deposit.

I took her suggestion.

I had been busy and did not monitor my fixed deposit. Recently, I was shocked that the fixed deposit had matured and the money had been credited to my current account, without earning any interest for two years.

The relationship manager did not call me, as she had promised. She had since left the bank.

I know that it is mainly my fault for not monitoring the fixed deposit maturity date. I did receive a monthly ban statement but I found it to be quite confusing. It had several pages of points that I was not interested in.  I looked for the fixed deposit detail but could not see it earlier. It was in the statement but hidden away from the irrelevant and distracting details.

I get the nasty feeling that this is a deliberate practice by the bank to deprive the customer of the interest rate on fixed deposit. Although the interest rate is quite low, i.e. less than 1.5%, it is better than nothing. I feel that the bank had cheated me.

REPLY
I agree with you. Customers should not trust their banks as they are keen to increase their profit at the expense of the customers. Customers should pay attention to monitor their fixed deposits. 

Tan Kin Lian
 

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