This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on November 12, 2019

KUALA LUMPUR: Amanah Raya Bhd, which had prepared over one million wills as of Oct 31, is looking to grow the number by 5% to 10% next year.

Its group managing director Adenan Md Yusof said the government-owned trustee company will prepare some 35,000 wills this year, and more than 50,000 next year.

He was speaking to reporters after Amanah Raya signed an agreement with AmBank Islamic Bhd, a subsidiary of AMMB Holdings Bhd, to collaborate in offering legacy planning solutions.

“Tying up with AmBank Islamic will allow us to target AmBank’s customers who have net worths of more than a million,” Adenan noted.

For AmBank, the collaboration will enable its customers to conduct their legacy planning at AmBank branches, including nine AmBank signature priority banking centres nationwide, he said.

This is in line with AmBank Islamic’s strategy to offer a complete suite of wealth management products and services, including wealth distribution and legacy preservation.

“We are pleased to collaborate with Amanah Raya, an organisation with 90 years of experience in legacy planning industry via its range of will, trust and estate management services,” said Datuk Sulaiman Mohd Tahir, chief executive officer (CEO) at Ambank Group.

Amanah Raya, meanwhile, shared it has been collaborating with various organisations in both the public and private sectors, including financial institutions, insurance and takaful companies, to increase public awareness of the importance of legacy planning.

Last year, Amanah Raya partnered with the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) for the nomination of individual’s EPF savings, under which the EPF revised its policy to provide the option for members to appoint Amanah Raya as nominee, administrator and trustee for their EPF savings.

“The EPF has this problem in nomination, as most of its contributors nominate their children as nominees. Some of them, when they pass away, their children are still very young, under the age of 18, [so] they cannot be the administrator and nominee.

“That is the reason the EPF asked us to come in to become the members’ nominees, if the members choose it to be so.

“We also provide free will [writing services] for EPF members who appoint Amanah Raya as their nominees,” he said.