You will choose an account model together and put the first transfers in place.
You have the trade-offs of the three models from lesson 2.1, the questions to ask about joint accounts from lesson 2.2, and a first drawing of your payday flow from lesson 2.3. Couples often stall right here, with a sketch and good intentions, because the actual setup means sitting together with two phones and four banking apps.
This exercise gets it done in one sitting of about half an hour. Bring both phones, your drawing, and the answers you collected from your bank.
Look at what you each wrote for lesson 2.1 and choose one model: fully joint, fully separate or hybrid. Then write a single sentence explaining the choice. Keep it about your situation, not about what is normal.
Good reasons sound like this: "Hybrid, because our incomes are far apart and we both want money we do not have to explain." Or: "Fully joint, because one of us plans to stop work within a year and we do not want the money to change hands when that happens." Or: "Fully separate for now, because one of us is still clearing a debt, and we will look again after it is paid."
The sentence matters later. When you review the arrangement, it reminds you what problem you were solving.
Go through every account each of you holds and give it a label. Keep means it has a job in the new model. Open means you need an account you do not have yet, usually a joint one. Close means it has no job and is just one more balance to watch.
Before opening anything, check the terms. Look at minimum balance fees, whether the account earns bonus interest and on what conditions, and the signing instruction, using your answers from lesson 2.2. Rename each account in your apps after its job, such as Shared, Flat fund, Daniel personal or Hui Min personal, so the purpose shows every time you log in.
Close accounts only after any GIRO or salary crediting has moved off them, or a bill will bounce.
Pick the transfer that matters most, usually each partner's contribution into the shared account, and create it now as a recurring monthly instruction. Use the amount from your drawing and date it a day or two after the later salary arrives. If the contribution amounts will change after module 3, set up a starting amount anyway. Changing an existing instruction later takes a minute.
Check the account number on screen twice before you confirm. Take a screenshot of each instruction once it is saved.
If you chose fully separate, the equivalent is an agreed transfer between your personal accounts each month to settle up shared bills, or a standing arrangement for who pays which bill.
Pick a date three months away and put it in both your calendars, with a short note: "Review account model". At the review, ask three questions. Did every transfer run? Did either of us feel short, or feel we had to ask permission? Is there a bill nobody was paying? Three months is long enough to see a few paydays, including a month with a surprise cost, and short enough to fix a design that is not working before it causes resentment.
Hui Min and Daniel, from earlier lessons, sit down on a Sunday afternoon. All figures are examples.
Their sentence reads: "Hybrid, because our incomes are far apart, Daniel's commission varies, and we each support our own parents." They label their accounts. Daniel keeps his salary account, because it earns bonus interest on his salary, and his old savings account, which becomes his emergency money. He closes a dormant account he opened for a promotion years ago. Hui Min keeps her salary account and her savings account. Together they open a joint account with an "either to sign" instruction, which they name Shared, and a pot inside it called Flat fund for their BTO savings.
They each create a standing transfer of S$1,500 to Shared on the 2nd of the month, the placeholder amount from lesson 2.3. Rent, utilities and the internet bill are moved to Shared by GIRO and standing instruction over the following two weeks. Two screenshots go into a folder called Household. In both calendars, three months out, is a reminder titled "Review account model: Shared and Flat fund".
That is what done looks like: one model chosen with a sentence explaining why, every account labelled keep, open or close, at least one standing transfer running into the shared account, and a review date that both of you will see.
Open your banking apps side by side, with your drawing between them, and start with the sentence.
Agree your model, set up one standing transfer, and write the review date in both your calendars.
Junxiong-WFG Organisation is an authorised representative of AIA Financial Advisers Private Limited (Reg. No. 201715016G).