We thank Mr Lim Tong Wah for his letter (More clarity needed on CPF Life payouts; Aug 14).

CPF Life payouts are determined by an independent actuarial consultant.

Members will be informed of their actual CPF Life payout shortly before their payout starts.

This payout is computed based on the member's Retirement Account balance at that point.

In Mr Lim's case, as he has not reached his payout eligibility age, we provided him with a set of projected payouts.

The estimated payout provided last month compared with January was an underestimate.

Mr Lim's Retirement Account balance remained the same from January to last month because the interest accrued will only be credited to his account in January next year.

With the same Retirement Account balance, last month's projection was lower than January's because last month's projection included interest that would have been earned for the six months from last month to December, whereas the January projection included interest for the full year.

We agree that this method of projection has caused confusion and unnecessary alarm to members.

We apologise for the inconvenience caused.

To improve our communication of payout estimates to members, we will revise our projection for CPF Life payouts to include all interest earned, as is the case for actual CPF Life payouts today.

We wish to assure Mr Lim that when he starts his actual CPF Life payouts, all interest earned will be paid to him and streamed out through his monthly payouts.

Irene Kang (Ms)

Group Director (Communications)

Central Provident Fund Board