MR LI: We met this agent called Priscilla Tan from Prudential at an Expo car show. Wanted to get some life insurance and we did check with a few companies. We were dragging for a few months to check but she was not pushy, and always followed up with us like friend. After month we buy the life insurance happiy.
We built up trust and she would bring along her senior manager, Raynard Lim, when we meet up. One day, she told us about a CPF investment scheme and asked my wife to buy it. My wife told her that we will soon need the money to buy a house, but she said not to worry as we can take it out any time. She told us now would be a good time to invest, and she would personally monitor our investment so that even if lose money, it wouldn’t be very much. She didn’t tell us there would be a 3 percent fee.
Lim even persuaded my wife to show hand and invest S$90,000, even though my wife was uncertain about investing so much money. She signed the contract after he kept telling her not to worry. After a few weeks, my wife heard that the market dropped. Priscilla told us not to worry. Her manager, Lim, also told us not to worry.
Last week, when we wanted to take out our money for a 15 percent down payment on our house, Priscilla went missing! She didn’t reply to our calls and Whatsapp messages. It was only when we went to the Prudential customer service centre that we found out we had been scammed – the time when we bought the investment scheme was peak period. After we put out our money, the market dropped badly. To think she kept telling us not to worry. By that time, my wife’s CPF already lost almost S$10,000!
After I left the customer service centre, Priscilla called us and told us not to draw out the money, and not to return to the customer service centre. She didn’t want them to find out what she and her manager were doing, and how they caused us to lose S$10,000 in 6 months! I checked with the manager over the phone and he told me we aren’t the first people to face this issue. In other words, they just earn their commission and don’t care about others?
Untrained agents really can do anything so long as they earn their commission. Even if we write in to complain, the company will only issue a letter of apology, and the agent will still get the commission! This is very unfair and I feel it is very dangerous for any one of us, or the elderly who want to buy a policy.
I really wish u can alert people who buy insurance from any company or any agent not to buy based on trust. Ask people who understand English to read the policy terms and explain to you. I’m very upset about this and I hope the government can set a rule against such bad rats!
Thank you Mr Li for sharing this story with us.
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