JiPay review - is it a great money app for migrant workers in Singapore?

JiPay®¹ Singapore offers a holding account and linked payment card for migrant workers to get paid directly in SGD by their employer, and then use for personal saving and spending. JiPay cards are also available to help manage family finances, allowing parents to issue cards to their children and dependents, as well as dimestic helpers.

If you’re interested in getting the JiPay card - or if you’re a migrant worker wondering about using JiPay to send money home to loved ones - you need this JiPay review. We’ll cover all you need to know about how JiPay works, and also touch on Wise as an easy, low cost way to send money home to loved ones - and to manage your money day to day across SGD, PHP, IDR, and whichever other currencies you might need.

Table of contents
What is JiPay? Benefits and features JiPay products JiPay remit - watch out for exchange rates Wise account - a non-bank alternative for sending money abroad Summary

What is JiPay? Benefits and features

JiPay is an app which offers an account to hold Singapore dollars, with a linked payment card you can use in stores, to get cash, and to tap in and out of transport. You can also use PayNow with JiPay in the app, to pay even when cards aren’t accepted.

JiPay is marketed as a smart way for families with children and domestic helpers to manage their money more easily. You can get one or more linked cards from JiPay, to allow an employer to issue cards for household spending to a helper - or to let a family hand cards to their kids for day to day spending around town.

To make life easier for migrant workers in particular, JiPay also offered easy ways to get paid to a JiPay personal account directly, and ways to send money home right from the app².

JiPay cashback - which was a popular offer when the app was launched - is not available at the time of writing. However, it’s worth keeping an eye out in case this, or other promotional offers, come along with JiPay again.

Some services through JiPay are free to access - for others, there’s a subscription fee to pay³.

JiPay personal account

JiPay offers personal accounts⁴ to migrant workers, to get paid directly in SGD by their employers, with a linked card for easy spending. There’s also a JiPay PayNow service you can use to scan and pay where cards aren’t accepted - for example in a wet market or hawker center, or in a smaller store. Personal accounts have a few handy features, including remittance options and ways to save - and track your personal budget - right from your phone. We’ll look at these features in more detail in just a moment.

JiPay card

If you open a JiPay personal account as a migrant worker you can get a free JiPay card to spend anywhere you see the Mastercard logo. This card is linked to your personal account only - so if your employer and their family also have a JiPay account you can rest assured your finances are kept separate from theirs.

You may also find your employer issues a JiPay card to allow you to shop on behalf of the family without having to use cash every time. That can be more convenient for you, and it’ll allow the whole family to keep track of spending and costs, for more transparency. If you’re issued a payment card like this, your employer can easily top up the account whenever required so you shouldn’t run short of money.

JiPay save

Use your JiPay personal account to save towards your personal financial goals⁵. You can keep track of your money in your JiPay app, and if you have your employer deposit your pay into the account it’s easy to track your funds, and make transfers directly from your account to loved ones back home.

You’ll be able to create separate pots for saving, and move money back to your own day to day spending account if you ever need to, in just a few taps on the JiPay app.

JiPay remit - watch out for exchange rates

If you send money home to loved ones, you can skip standing in line at a remittance office, and send your payment right from the JiPay app⁶. Currencies including PHP and IDR are supported, and you’ll see the exchange rates and fees available in the JiPay app, so you can compare them to the offers in the nearest remittance office, or with other online providers.

You can send to a bank account, to a mobile money account, or for cash collection, with variable fees and rates.

Before you make a remittance with JiPay, compare the costs and exchange rate available with other services, to see which offers the best overall deal. JiPay remittances may have a transfer fee, and there could also be another charge - an exchange rate markup - added into the exchange rate used to convert your funds from SGD to the currency you’re sending. This isn’t easy to spot, but it drives up the overall cost, and can mean you’re spending more than you need to.

Compare the exchange rate offered by JiPay with the mid-market exchange rate you can find on Google, to see if there’s an extra fee added here. If the JiPay rate and the Google rate are different, the chances are that there’s a markup. That may mean you’re better off with a different service like Wise - more on that next.

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Wise account - a non-bank alternative for sending money abroad and managing your money in Singapore

Compare the costs of sending money home with JiPay against the fees and exchange rates available from Wise.

Wise offers online and in-app international transfers to the Philippines, Indonesia and a broad range of other countries, with the mid-market exchange rate and no hidden fees. Whenever you switch currencies you’ll see the fees and rate in the Wise app - and the costs can be as low as 0.43%⁷.

Wise transfers can arrive fast - or even instantly⁸ - and depending on where you’re sending to, you can decide to have the payment deposited to a bank or popular mobile money account for convenience.

For your own personal finances, you can also get a handy Wise account to get paid in SGD and hold and exchange to any of the 40+ supported currencies, including PHP and IDR. That means you don’t need a Singapore bank account to get paid, and you can conveniently convert to the currency you need for sending home. Plus you’ll be able to order a linked Wise card - and make PayNow transfers easily where cards aren’t accepted.

See if you can save with a Wise account, and low cost international transfers, today.

Pricing/fees: Please see Terms of Use for your region or visit Wise Fees & Pricing for the most up to date pricing and fee information

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Summary

JiPay was launched as a way to make it easier for migrant workers and domestic helpers to manage their money and send payments home - with extra features so families can manage a household budget smoothly across multiple family members, and different generations, and give independent spending options for their helpers too.

If you’re a migrant worker in Singapore, JiPay may be a convenient way to get paid, and send money home - but it’s not necessarily the cheapest or the most flexible. Compare the options from JiPay against the Wise account and card, to see which works best for you.

Wise offers low cost transfers to 70+ countries, with fees as low as 0.41%, plus the option to hold 50+ currencies and get paid easily in 9 currencies, including SGD. That can mean you get all you need to manage your money and send payments home, without needing to rely on a bank account.

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Sources:

1. JiPay app
2. JiPay Migrant worker
3. JiPay terms and conditions
4. JiPay personal account and card
5. JiPay Save
6. JiPay remit
7. Pricing/fees: Please see Terms of Use for your region or visit Wise Fees & Pricing for the most up to date pricing and fee information
8. Speed: The speed of transaction claim depends on funds availability, approval by Wise's proprietary verification system and systems availability of our partners' banking system, and may not be available for all transactions

Sources checked on 19/05/2023