CPF

Step By Step Guide To Opening Your Supplementary Retirement Scheme (SRS) Account

Open an SRS account before the minimum statutory retirement age increase.

by
Sharon Zhong
December 22, 2021

While some would rely solely on their CPF as their main retirement plan, Singapore residents have another option to build a bigger retirement nest egg. We can open a Supplementary Retirement Scheme (SRS) account to enjoy dollar-for-dollar tax relief while investing our SRS funds. According to OCBC Financial Wellness Index 2021, 8 out of 10 Singaporeans underestimate our retirement needs by almost 31% on average. The SRS is another tool in our arsenal that we can use to build up our future funds to meet our retirement needs.

Why Start A Supplementary Retirement Scheme (SRS) Account Before 1 July 2022

Opening your SRS account early is important because of how the penalty-free withdrawal age for SRS is determined. This age for withdrawing our SRS funds is based on the minimum statutory retirement age when we open our SRS account. Currently, the minimum statutory retirement age is 62, and it will be raised to 63 on 1 July 2022, and gradually to 65 by 2030. This will affect those who open their SRS accounts after 1 July 2022. Thus, it makes sense to open an SRS account now to “lock in” the current statutory retirement age for withdrawals.

For those who already have an SRS account, we will be able to withdraw from the prevailing statutory retirement age when we opened our SRS account.

So, in case you’d like to quickly “lock in” your SRS withdrawal age at 62, here are the steps to opening your SRS account.

Note: We will be using OCBC online banking as the example but the steps should be similar for the 3 designated local banks for SRS account opening: DBS, OCBC and UOB.

Step By Step Guide To Applying For SRS Account

Step 1: Log in with your access code and PIN or fingerprint ID

Step 2: Authorise login using OCBC One Token on your mobile phone

Step 3: Navigate to Open an account and click on SRS Account

Step 4: There will be an optional account opening for Securities Trading Account. Tick the box if you would like to open a Securities Trading Account while opening an SRS account.

Otherwise, move to point 3, and select an account for the bank to cross reference your signature for the SRS account.

Step 5: Enter your personal details

Step 6: Tick the following boxes that’s applicable to you for point 5 and 6. For Point 7, select an account for debiting, and contribute any amount starting from $1.