Car Navigation System - now available for older cars

You may have seen this system in expensive new cars in Singapore or overseas.

The car naviation is now available for installation into older cars. I have recently installed the system in my 8 year old car, at a cost of $2,000.

The system is useful. It plans my route and has a voice system to alert me to make the correct turns. I use the system even if I am travelling on familiar roads, as it reminds me (in case my thought strays).

We plan to install this system on the shared cars that is being operated by our car coop. If you are interested, you can try the system on our coop ars.

We will make the shared cars available for people to drive into Malaysia. The navigation system now has the maps of Johore Bahru. It will be extended towards the whole of Malaysia towards the end of this year.

Reply to: Beware pitfalls of reverse mortgage

Editor
Forum Page
Staits Times

I refer to the letter from Mr Chong Kiam Khiun entitled 'Beware pitfalls of reverse mortgage' (ST, 24 Jul).

NTUC Income offers a reverse mortgage to assist a retiree to receive a monthly income to meet the living expense. The monthly income is taken as a loan charged against a private property and accumulates interest at a modest rate.

The loan is usually repaid at a future date when the retiree sells the property and find another place to live. Alternatively, on death of the retiree, the property is sold to repay the loan and the balance of the proceeds is returned to the estate.

To prevent any misunderstanding on the terms of the loan, we have taken the following measures over the years:

- We explain the working of the reverse mortgage to the retiree
- We ask a family member to acknowledge the retiree's acceptance of the agreement.
- The retiree and a family member have to attend the lawyer's office to execute the agreement

We also send an annual statement to the retiree. Details of the accumulated loan and other particulars, including the prevailing interest rate, are shown in the statement.

In the case quoted by Mr Cheong, the reverse mortgage was taken in 1997. At that time, the agreement was signed in the presence of another family member. Unfortunately, due to the drop in the price of the pledged property, the outstanding loan has reached the 80% level faster than anticipated. The retiree and family member are now discussing with us on the best arrangement to repay the loan. As there is still a buffer of 20%, we have sufficient time over the next two years to work out the best alternative.

The reverse mortgage has been helpful to many people. However, as this example shows, there is a need for the retiree to understand the terms and to make the appropriate adjustment to meet changing circumstances.

Tan Kin Lian
Chief Executive Officer
NTUC Income

Reply to "Exercise caution when buying ILPs: Income chief "

Editor
Forum Page
Straits Times

I refer to the article entitled "Exercise caution when buying ILPs: Income chief " (Straits Times, 23 June 2005).

Your correspondent has quoted me correctly on most parts of the article. However, I have been quoted out of context on the following point:

Mr Tan suggested that term insurance without any investment component may be a better option. 'Buy term and invest the difference so that you can avoid paying the commission payable to agents' he said.

I wish to clarify that the insurance adviser receives a commission on the premium paid under the term insurance policy.

In my view, the adviser should also be paid to advise the policyholder on insurance and financial planning. This is a valuable service that should be adequately remunerated. The adviser has to spend considerable time to acquire the knoweldge to provide this advice.

Under the new ILP plan that will soon be launched by NTUC Income, we will pay a modest flat fee to the insurance adviser, which will be recovered from a small charge over the next 20 years.

The adviser will also earn a modest rate of commision on the regular savings in the ILP plan. As the charges are low, this plan will allow the savings to earn a fairly good rate of return over the long term.

Tan Kin Lian
Chief Executive Officer
NTUC Income

Video record your home

Some families leave the maid alone at home. There is the risk that the maid can bring in strangers to the home.

Here is a simple way to take care of this problem. Install a camera with a DVD recorder. Record the view of the entrance throughout the day.

When you return home, you can use 32X speed to view the happenings in your home. This can be done in 15 minutes. Any visitor can be spotted easily.

You do not need to do this all the time. If the maid is aware about the recording, the maid will not take the risk. It will be a useful deterent.

When silence is the norm, but helps no one

I refer to your news comment by Adrian Tan in Today paper of 14 June, entitled "When silence is the norm, but helps no one".

Adrian Tan referred to recent cases involving a few listed companies that are being investigated by the Commercial Affairs Department. The managers and investigators remained silent about what was happening. The investors were caught holding the shares, and did not know what to do with them.

Adrian Tan suggested that a panel of wise people be formed to help decide on what information could be displosed to the investing public.

I strongly support this suggestion. The panel can help to clear the following uncertainty:

- Who should decide? Yes, the panel.

- How to decide when things are uncertain? The decision is made through discussion, judgement and by majority of the panel.

We have to accept that many issues are not clear cut, and some decision has to be taken. We cannot wait until things are certain. We cannot procrastinate.

In America, many issues involving the public are debated over television. This is a healthy process in dealing with diverse views. I hope to see this done more actively in Singapore.

Keep the serial number of your mobilephone

Before anyone loses his/her mobile phone, one should first check the serial number of the phone by keying in *#06# where a 15-digit number will appear on the screen.

Please record it down and keep it for reference. In case the phone is lost, the rightful owner can call the service provider (Singtel, M1, Starhub, etc) to disable the phone by providing the serial number.

That means, the person who took the phone cannot use it at all even if they insert a new SIM card. If everyone knows this procedure, there would not be much use Taking away someone's phone. Please feel free to circulate this message.

Give the foreign made a day off

Some employers do not give their foreign maid a day off for fear that the maid may engage in promiscuous activity or mix with bad company and may esult in pregnancy or running away from home. This may result in the $5,000 bond being confiscated by the Ministry of Manpower.

The risk is quite small. If the maid gets pregnant, it will be discovered in the medical checkup. The employer can arrange to send the worker home.

Promote Car Pooling

In the United Kingdom, the authority found that there are too many cars on their motorways. They are implementing a system of car-sharing.

We have a similar situation in Singapore. When I attend a social function, eg wedding dinner, I usually find most people come alone in their cars. The car parks are full.

We should encourage people to car-pool. The guests can contact each other, and come in one car.

We tried to introduce an internet-based car pooling system previously. It did not work.

I like to try again. This time, we will use our call center. If anyone wants to car pool, they contact our call center (special number) and indicate their function. The call center should be able to locate another person who is attending the same function and get them to contact each other.

Let us give it a try.

Get Married Earlier

I have been encouraging our ladies to get married earlier, before they embark on a career. Most people disagree with me.

I was surprised to hear this story of someone who had actualy done so. Here is her story.

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I MARRIED DURING UNIVERSITY

Marriage for the Singaporeans' ladies seems to be a secondary priority and late marriages and childbearing is most common in Singapore and many developed countries especially for the educated women.

I tend to differ. I believe that early marriage and child birth provides more benefits though the early years are are tougher with lesser income and stronger need for career building.

I married in my third year of University, and gave birth at the age of 24 and 26 years old. This is most rare as most of my friends only got married at the age of 30.

The decision was to settle early and have an "early" retirement from motherhood. Starting early mean that at the age of 40, the prime of my career and life, my 2 children are already teenager and babysitting is no longer required.

Furthermore, youth provides me with more energy to nurture and play with my children.

YO

It is stealing

A sushi restaurant installed a system to charge a customer based on the sushi plate that is taken off the conveyor belt. This is captured through a RFID device placed on the plate.

A group of students discuss how to prevent customer from "beating the system" by taking the sushi from the plate, and leaving the plate on the conveyor belt. The system will not be able to detect that the sushi has been removed.

The solution is simple. Put up a sign that say, "Removing the sushi from the plate is considered as stealing".

We should know the difference between stealing and "beating the system".