Daughter’s education left hanging after CPF Board allegedly disallows father to withdraw and pay for fees

A 60-year old father said that he might have to resort to choosing between borrowing money, and stopping his daughter’s education because he was allegedly disallowed from using his Central Provident Fund (CPF) money to pay for his child’s education.

Mr Lim Koh Leong wrote on Facebook that despite having more than enough money in his CPF account, he was allegedly told by staff that he could not use the funds there.

In a post, he wrote, “Because my salary did not reach the lowest deposit I can’t apply to use CPF for my daughter’s school fees. I want to ask, right now in my CPF there is 70,000+, I only need 15,000 to pay for my daughter’s school fees”.

Being 60-years old, and not having a job stable enough to pay for his daughter’s education, he wished to use some of his CPF funds to pay for it.

When he went to CPF building to inquire, he said that the response of the staff there shocked him.

He was allegedly told, “The past is the past, now is now, now the rules changed, if you did not hit the lowest deposit, you can’t take your CPF money”.

Mr Lim then requested again because he only needed a partial amount of S$15,000 for his daughter’s education as he had S$70,000 in his CPF account.

To this, he wrote that the staff allegedly replied, “Can apply, the chance of it is zero”.

“I felt cheated, humiliated, angry. So many years of hard work, sweat and tears to earn the money and it’s inside CPF. It is suppose (sic) to be my money. I’m in need of it and yet, I cannot take my own money to help pay my daughter’s school fees”.

Mr Lim wrote that he may have to take loans, or even stop his daughter’s education because he was unable to afford it.

“As a father, i want to help my daughter, looking at my CPF that still has a bit of money to pay but can’t do it”.

“What should i do? What can i do?” he lamented.

TISG has reached out to both Mr Lim and to the CPF Board for clarification.

UPDATE: CPF responds, says father with insufficient cash for daughter’s education cannot make a withdrawal

/TISG