Compared to Cambodia, Philippines,,, China banks are better .. easy2visit; 24H hotline; efficient
— Common t$costs
- Common $cost: cross-bank ATM.. LGlp small amount
- Common tcost: revive a dormant/de-activated account or ATM card
- Common tcost: replace expired passport.. Need to bring old + new passports to a branch. If you don’t update, then you will face difficulty when you bring an unrecognized passport to branches.
— Common operations:
* operation: check balance, cash-out
* operation: deposit at ATM or transfer-in. [Transfer-out requires SMS OTP sent to a real-name phone number š ]
* operation: update mobile num
* operation: update password/PIN
==== BOC/ICBC offshore RMB facility
Warning — any RMB amount I withdraw(min Y50)/spend in China, from BOC.sg account may get locked up inside China indefinitely, since you can’t deposit the amount back to this offshore account. Remember our long-term goal to bring out our RMB assets.
RMB time deposit is self-service on mobank. Safe early withdrawal.
Default plan:
- place time deposit to earn some interest, but we might leave some 1k buffer for “dire_situation” below.
- Favor shor-term TD for RMB. When SGD/RMB improves (drops), withdraw in physical RMB (FOC), and convert to SGD at money-changer.
- .. If you convert at BOC, bid/ask spread can be as big as 1300 pips i.e. 5.32/5.45. FX rate is unlinked to unionpay
— j4: use my MCSA as a contingency “resource” in addition to my onshore accounts [ICBC,PSBC, HSBC,,], when onshore accounts deplete/dwindle, or grandparents are unavailable. (This was my original hope for the EGA sub-account.)
In a dire_situation like running out of money for subway/food/taxi, having “another contingency RMB account” can mean the difference between having money vs penniless.Ā Even a SGD resource would alleviate this dire_situation.
We tend to neglect such a dire_situation as it is rare. I seldom spend more than RMB 3k/week. This “j4” is like disaster-recovery planning.
— Usage: branch deposit of excess RMB carried to Singapore. Keeping physical RMB long term in Singapore is a stressor and a hazard.
— UsageĀ (LGlp) ATM/POS:Ā Withdrawal is free at BOC machines (RMB 20/withdrawal at non-BOC). Deposit unsupported.
POS is available at “major” merchants, where foreigners shop, without wcpay/alipay. Eg: Xiaomi shop.
Any RMB deduction will hit this sub-account first. If exhausted, then SGD will be converted, with no fees.
UnionPay card is better supported than MasterCard.