Tan Kin Lian's Blog: Personal attacks

Sunday, April 27, 2008

Personal attacks

I have blocked many unsubstantiated remarks levied against NTUC Income, its products, its agents and management.

I allow some of the negative comments to go through, if they are not personal and make a point that is based on facts.

I have also received personal attacks against me. I block them, if they are personal and malicious. However, I have decided to allow some of them to go through.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...: I disagree with what you say about remarks about the poor quality of ntuc new products. The remarks are true. The readers can substantiate by getting a quotation from the company
The new products like revosave and vivolife are products that shortchange the customer in many ways.
When you buy a product it is for the PURPOSE of meeting needs and not some fanciful wants and cutomers' idiosyncracies which revosave promotes. The test of a good product is it must give GOOD and OPTIMAL value in terms of return and protection at reasonable cost and which revosave fails.Revosave marketing confuses and distracts the customers with nonsensical abstract and dubious tag lines.
For vivo life it is obvious that this new product has a lot of cover ups, to cover up the poor return and protection and now the issue of of low annual bonus.It uses frills and unnecessary and useless features to cover up the short comings and to distract the buyers.
One should notice companies are now resorting to using ploys and heavy marketing to deceive the customers and also using agents' clients relationship to push them.Worse is using money or high commission to feed the greed of the agents resulting in unethical practices.
Insurance agents are not happy naturally becuase their products are "attacked". I call this evaluation and evaluation is nuetral and objective and truthful.
Agents should defend instead of whinning. Consumers should get the best deal and not just fair deal.
I hope MAS will address this.; April 27, 2008 10:29 AM
Anonymous said...: Sunday Times 27 Apr 08.Pg 27 (Your Personal Advisor:Finance) Q & A.
One Mr Chong (New Independant) advises someone to buy NTUC Income revosave for low risk option which is better than Fixed deposit. I suppose he must be some expert to be considered by ST to be featured answering questions from readers.
So what is the conclusion, Revosave good or no good? Or is there no clearcut conclusion, like half full or half empty depending on how you look at it?; April 27, 2008 12:34 PM
Anonymous said...: You notice the comparison is with the FD ( FD is always used as a bogeyman)FD is 0.9%?
However if Mr. Chong has taken in consideration the present value of all FD cashflows and consider the risks of revosave such as liquidity, lock in , and high cost revosave won't even appear equal.
(lock in for FD is 6 months or 1 year) Revosave returns is miserable 1.8% over at least 20 years.(the lock in period) You are also better off than revosave if you keep under your bed. You have complete control , liquidity and maximum freedom to do what money can do for you.
These are the ugly downsides of revosave.
If you are really saving or investing for the future revosave is a rotten product which you should not touch with a 5 foot pole even. In fact you are better off, although not recommended, investing in a pure plain vanilla regular endowment and you get better protection coverage and better return.
You don't have to believe me. Get your agent to give a quote for both and compare.
The best of the best is buy your pure protection to meet your needs fully and invest the rest to get the maximum return. Worry about risk? Let me advise you , the risk is lower than the endowments, the return is much higher and more importantly it is higher than inflation. The inflation now is 6.6% So what do you think?

Zhumeng:o); April 27, 2008 2:40 PM
Anonymous said...: Mr. Chong has misdefined liquidity and also played into hand of nTuc. As a FA he represents NTUC products too. He assumes 2% inflation, which is very unlikely (now is 6.5%), but revosave returns less 2 %. So is there protection against inflation, even assuming 2% inflation?

Liquidity is defined as ability to access cash ANY TIME and without capital loss. It is not after 2 years and then after every 1 year AND ONLY 60% OF YOUR CAPITAL IS AVAILABLE.

If you consider time value of money Fixed Deposit is better.
Of course to better than FD and revosave investing into a money market fund is the best. The money market, also known as cash equivalent, can pay as high as 3%, no lock in, complete liquidity and you can draw it or partially anytime to invest in other instruments that return much higher return.
For a very risk averse person , assuming you are old, this is the best option and not that revosave which ties you down for a life time and deprives you all the the future opportunities.; April 27, 2008 3:22 PM
Khiat Han Hwee Adrian said...: 2 points I like to bring up:

1) I also disagree with Mr Chong's remarks about the liquidity of revosave.
If a person wants to save, not via an investment, choose the simplest plain vanilla endowment plan. It can expect to give higher returns.

2) The usage of 2% as the yield for revosave when the person choose to cash-out the yearly cashback is incorrect because we had failed to recognised that the cashback are re-invested into the market.
* If the cashback are not assumed to be reinvested, then the cashback amount should not be considered as the principle to calculate the yield.
* For those who knows how to calculate the yield, try it and see what the yield for revosave is.

Adrian Khiat
http://akhiat.blogspot.com; April 28, 2008 9:27 PM
Anonymous said...: Mr. Chong earns commission from selling Revosave.

Compare recommended people to buy the cheapest term and invest the rest in ETFs (for example), he would certainly earn more for selling Revosave.

What do you think?; April 28, 2008 9:43 PM
Anonymous said...: Mr. Chong has conflict of interest when he recommended revosave. If his cleint has been saving in FD I cannot understand why revosave is chosen as better alternative vehicle. THe right vehicle should be a money market which gives same liquidity and better return and not a risky revosave whiich deprives his client of the upsides which he is looking for.
Revosave locks up the client and yet gives miserable return which is eaten up by inflation. In fact revosave should be renamed as RETRoSAVE.; April 28, 2008 11:20 PM
Anonymous said...: Adtrain. tell us the yeild if we wish to cash out he cashbacks every year.
What if we stop three quarter way how much is the yield?
Tell us how much is the yield if we are "sway sway" cash strapped and and can't afford to pay the second last premium?
Let me tell you. It is loss, loss and loss. But if you hold to maturity do you expect a pot of gold? No, the amount is to compensate you all losses all the way before maturity.
What is the net return? Adrain, give us the answer for the guy who prodded for 25 years.; April 28, 2008 11:44 PM
Anonymous said...: Mr Tan,

thank you for being so kind to share financial advice freely to the man-on-the-street (who needs it the most).

I appreciate it.

For those personal attacks, pls ignore them, there are always people like that all around.; May 02, 2008 8:50 PM