Forum: Using SkillsFuture credit top-up for annual subscription may defeat its purpose

With the one-off $500 SkillsFuture Credit top-up due to expire on Dec 31, 2025, there has been much recent publicity on using the credit for annual subscriptions for online learning (

What to do with your expiring SkillsFuture credits

, Dec 19). 

This allows a subscriber to use the credit for online learning beyond the deadline, in contrast to a “non-subscription” course which has to start by Dec 31, 2025.  

At first glance, the subscription option is attractive, what with Dec 31 rapidly approaching and fewer courses available during the holiday season (presumably, vendors and trainers are on a break too).

A person may, however, sign up for an annual subscription just to not “waste” the top-up (in true-blue Singaporean fashion), but may eventually use little, or worse, none, of it.  

So the party that stands to gain from this exercise is the vendor offering the subscription, not the subscriber, and SkillsFuture’s well-intentioned aims would hardly be advanced. 

How effective is this a use of government funds?

There are several courses on the My SkillsFuture website that will start after Dec 31 but the top-up cannot be used to pay for these. 

If there is a principle behind this restriction, is this not contradicted by the annual subscription letting one attend an online course which starts in 2026, as some may not even be confirmed for now?

Mildred Ho