Singapore Expats

Hi, all brothers and sisters.
I plan to open a bank account in Singapore.
Who knows about which banks required the most lowest initial deposit and the lowest monthly balance to avoid extra fee charge?

I opened DBS with $0 and they have never asked me for a minimum deposit level. they have a load of ATMs and seem fine to me, I'm sure others will differ!

DBS/POSB lines are always longer at ATMs though

I opened one with POSB years ago after having an odd experience with UOB.

Went into UOB and got told that I couldn't have a chequebook or ATM card because my husband wasn't opening an account with me.

I had a look around to make sure I hadn't gone into the Twilight Zone by accident and yes, it was still 2002 and not 1952..........

Now I look back on it - I'm glad I opened with POSB and not UOB because there are far more ATMs and banks for POSB (and you can use DBS too)

They do charge though - $2 per month if you have under $1,000 in there or something - it's not much at all.

you can get the $2 a month waived at opening!

nutnut wrote:you can get the $2 a month waived at opening!

d'oh - if only I'd known that 10 years ago! Not much point asking them about it now - we're moving away in a few months.

nutnut: Since my company can accept bank account from DBS or POSB, so I decide to open account in DBS because I just came to Singapore recently and don't have so much money on hand. Therefore, better choose a bank which can open account without initial deposit.

BigSis: Thanks for your advice. Yup, I also wouldn't consider UOB. How much initial deposit when you open POSB account?

Thanks nutnut and BigSis, I just came to Singapore and feel so strange to those things. Really appreciate for your helps. ^^ Wish you guys all the best.

I seem to remember putting in $500 but not sure if that's what they wanted or whether I just thought it'd be a good starting point.

You could probably ring them up and ask them. Sometimes they have different rules for foreigners and locals - we may have to put more in to open an account than someone from Singapore.

Dear all, I'm already successfully open the bank account at POSB bank (POSB is the sister company of DBS, so now both regulation to open a bank account is the same).

I'm a EP holder but I'm not yet receive my EP pass, so I use my In-Principle Approval Letter to open the bank account. There is no minimum initial deposit required, you can save any amount in your bank account even with zero amount. For account below amount SGD1000, there is a SGD2 charge on it and this will start on the second month after you opened the account.

I know that most of the people will bring their money when go back to hometown, so in order to avoid cancellation of the account, you just need to make sure your amount not becoming zero (must consider for the deduction SGD2 fees charge for account below SGD1000).

I hope this can help most of the new comer to Singapore. Wish you guys all the best ^^

Sounds similar to my experience, except I told them to stick the $2 charge and they did. Maybe it was just me being bullish

Thank you for feeding back and trying to help others, that is what this place is about!

Glad you got your bank sorted Skywalker.

Actually thinking about what Nutnut says about the $2 fee - they possibly will scrap it if you ask them. A Singaporean lady I know told me that she never pays her credit/debit card fees - she used to ring up and ask them to cancel the fee and they always did. Now apparently, her bank have an option on the phone "if you would like to have your credit card fee waived, press 4".......that kind of thing.

It seems like if you don't ask, you don't get - and I've never asked so I've always paid this fee, not realising that I could probably have had it cancelled.

I have been with HSBC but recently they have closed a few branches down. And that really upsets me....

BigSis wrote:Glad you got your bank sorted Skywalker.

Actually thinking about what Nutnut says about the $2 fee - they possibly will scrap it if you ask them. A Singaporean lady I know told me that she never pays her credit/debit card fees - she used to ring up and ask them to cancel the fee and they always did. Now apparently, her bank have an option on the phone "if you would like to have your credit card fee waived, press 4".......that kind of thing.

It seems like if you don't ask, you don't get - and I've never asked so I've always paid this fee, not realising that I could probably have had it cancelled.

Most banks do that for your standard annual credit card fees, but not anything else. I had a mileage program on my POSB card. They were firm in that they could always waive the normal card fee, but not the additional fee for the mileage add-on... They gladly canceled it though for me.