With the cost of living soaring in recent years, many Malaysians are finding it increasingly difficult to get by with their earnings.
As such, a portion of Malaysians have been left with no choice but to dip into their retirement savings to survive and not be crushed by their financial commitments.
42% of M’sians withdrew cash from EPF Account 3 to repay debts
The Star recently conducted an online poll among 1,300 Malaysians during the week before the last day of the Account 3 opt-in on Aug 31.
According to the poll’s findings, 42% of Malaysians who opted for Employees Provident Fund’s (EPF) Account 3 revealed they had withdrawn money from there to pay off their debts.
624 individuals (48%) had opted for the one-time transfer, while 679 respondents chose not to opt in. However, only 29% (382 respondents) had actually withdrew any funds from their Account 3.
Aside from paying off outstanding debts, other reasons given by the respondents for why they withdrew from their Account 3 included education (12.57%), shopping (8.63%), setting up a business (5.56%), emergency expenses (5.4%), personal investment (4.4%) and daily expenditure (4.1%).
What is Account 3 exactly?
In case you’ve forgotten how Account 3, also known as Akaun Fleksibel, came into being, it was launched in May to help Malaysians financially sustain themselves before reaching the retirement age.
Under the new EPF structure, monthly contributions are split into three: 75% into Account 1 (Akaun Persaraan), 15% into Account 2 (Akaun Sejahtera) and 10% into Account 3.
It was previously reported that as of July 19, 3.8 million EPF members chose to reallocate their savings from Account 2 to Account 3, while 3.4 million members opted to withdraw funds from Account 3.
Read more about it here:
