@ mummydila
CDA acct is a savings acct given to your child by the govt. The govt matches dollar to dollar for every dollar you saved into that acct for your child up to a max of 6K for the 1st n 2nd child, 3rd and 4th, the cap will be raised further. Meaning if you save 6K into that acct for your 1st child, govt will match that 6K so total you'll have 12K in that acct for that child alone. Anymore contributions made by you thereafter, govt's matching will cease.
Interest rate for CDA acct standardized at 0.5% generally higher than savings acct. So far only 2 banks are authorised by the govt, Stand Chart and OCBC, both have their own unique advantage, you need to find out with the banks' website and see which 1 suits you more.
The purpose of the CDA acct is for the child's
1) Enrichment fees.
2) Early Childhood Education fees.
3) School Education Related fees (Not school fees to my knowledge, I might be wrong thou, but school initiated activities will be allowed e.g. excursion).
4) Tertiary Education fees (Uni tuition fees)
5) Child's immunity jabs
6) General GP or PD consultation
If there is still balance left at the end of your child's tertiary education, the balance will be transfered over to his/her CPF OA acct.
Once savings deposited into CDA acct, you can't withdraw them out in cash.
You'll need to satisfy some criteria before you can apply which you should be able to find by googling CDA. The necessary forms were given to me by TMC at the time of my daughter's arrival. Thou the hospital could settle the application for me, I ended up doing everything myself which involved sending application letter to MCYS, going to the bank to set up acct and going to ICA to register her birth, as we were not able to finalize her chinese name at birth.
Hope this explains in detail.