Is the singapura finance vivid prepaid card good? How do we withdraw the money from the savings account? Is it worth to apply?

Hi Michelle,

I recently wrote a blog post on alternatives to JumpStart that you can consider, with Singapura Vivid being one of them.

I'm personally not a user of the Vivid account, but one of my readers commented that "Vivid account doesn’t offer FAST transfers out. You are given a prepaid debit card and with the app, you can load the card with money and spend it. There is ATM function for the debit card BUT the fees don’t make any sense so I never used the ATM card function."

Personally, with all these restrictions just to get an extra 0.05% interest, I would think that it is not worth all the hassle and would still be sticking to JumpStart.

I just gotten the card yesterday. Topped up $500 (min. balance) into the Vivid Savings Account just to see how it works.

It gives you:

$0 - $10000 = 1.05%
$10001 - $20000 = 1.30%
$20001 and above = 0.25%

And in conclusion, my advice is, don't open it for 3 main reasons:

1) Costly to withdraw/transfer to another bank account

If you want to withdraw the money, it'd cost $3 (waived till 30Dec20) to do it over the counter at any Singapura Finance branch. There is no option to transfer it via mobile. Singapura Finance prefers you to spend the money by transferring it to the Vivid Card. That is essentially the business model of how this Savings Account works.

2) Early termination fee (closure within 6 months)
If you close the account within 6 months, the early termination fee would cost you $25. And if you applied for the card, it'll cost you an additional $30.

3) Troublesome in checking balance
They do have a Vivid card application, however that application only tracks the balance in the Vivid Card. It does not reflect the balance in the Vivid Savings Account. To check your account balance, you are required to go to their webpage, key in the last 5 digits of your account number and they will drop you an SMS on your account balance.

My advice to you is to hold back from opening the account until their T&Cs loosen up. Basically this feels like Singtel Dash account, one way transactions where you can top up but can't withdraw.