DBS Foundation partners MSF to give boost to lower-income families

DBS will contribute S$30 million to two projects over the next three years to improve the livelihoods of lower-income families with children living in rental flats.

DBS Foundation will be the anchor partner for two ComLink+ packages – Preschool Education and Saving for Home Ownership. This is the first initiative that comes under the bank’s S$1 billion pledge made in August to uplift vulnerable segments of society over the coming decade.

Community Link (ComLink) is an initiative by the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF), which last month announced the introduction of ComLink+ packages.

The measures build on the existing ComLink programme which extends holistic support to lower-income families with children living in rental flats.

Four packages will be progressively rolled out from the second half of 2024 and trialled over three years.

The DBS Foundation X MSF partnership was launched by National Development Minister Desmond Lee and DBS Bank CEO Piyush Gupta at the National Gallery on Saturday (Dec 9).

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“Over the years, we’ve actively helped various segments of society through our banking and community initiatives,” said Gupta.

“This year, amid rising inflation and an uneven economic recovery, we rolled out an extensive package of cost-of-living measures to support our customers. By coming alongside the ComLink+ families – and providing that extra support so they can provide early education for their children, own a home sooner, and gain financial resilience – we hope to do our part in helping them build a better future.”

The Preschool Education package seeks to encourage families to prioritise children’s preschool education. Families that ensure their child is enrolled in preschool in the year they turn three years old will receive a one-off S$500 top-up in their Child Development Account (CDA); families will also receive a S$200 CDA top-up for every quarter of good school attendance.

The Saving for Home Ownership package aims to accelerate the progress of ComLink+ families towards owning a home. Families that make voluntary top-ups to their Central Provident Fund accounts to save for a home purchase will receive matched top-ups at a 2:1 ratio through this package.

DBS Foundation and MSF said they feel that families in Singapore can benefit from more targeted support and financial knowledge.

Both are also involved in piloting a tailored befriending programme. For a start, 400 of the bank’s employee volunteers will be progressively trained as befrienders for 200 ComLink+ families in Ang Mo Kio, Yishun, Boon Lay and Taman Jurong.

Said Lee: “This approach recognises that the pathways that our families take towards stability, self-reliance and social mobility are not always linear. A personal relationship with coaches and befrienders brought in, built on a strong foundation of trust and understanding, can go a long way in helping the family make sustained progress.”

Besides building a relationship with the families by regular interactions, the volunteer befrienders will also engage children from these families on key financial literacy concepts during the befriending journey. This move is a bid to ensure that good money habits are instilled from an early age.

Using a curriculum designed by the bank to make learning fun, the volunteers will take the children through topics such as savings and budgeting.

Through the various programmes, beneficiaries such as Siti Nur Nabilla and her family can aspire to purchase their own HDB flat.

The 23-year-old said that her family hopes to own their own flat in the next four years. She and her husband, who is the sole breadwinner as a full-time warehouse associate, are taking steps to build up their savings through his monthly income.

In all, about 8,500 children and 1,400 families are expected to benefit from the two packages yearly.