Chye Seng Kait v Chye Seng Fong (executor and trustee of the estate of Chye You, deceased)

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Andrew Phang Boon Leong JCA
• Judgment Date: 08 September 2021
• Neutral Citation: [2021] SGCA 86
• Published date: 14 September 2021
• Docket Number: Civil Appeal No 165 of 2020
• Year: 2021
• Hearing Date: 08 September 2021
• Plaintiff Counsel: Lim Seng Siew, Lip Wei De Eric and Chloe Chua Kay Ee (OTP Law Corporation)
• Citation: [2021] SGCA 86
• Defendant Counsel: Michael Khoo Kah Lip SC and Low Miew Yin Josephine (Michael Khoo & Partners) and Chiok Beng Piow (AM Legal LLC)
• Court: Court of Appeal (Singapore)
• Subject Matter: Personal representatives,Probate and Administration

Andrew Phang Boon Leong JCA (delivering the judgment of the court ex tempore):

This is an appeal against the decision of the High Court judge (“the Judge”) in Chye Seng Kait v Chye Seng Fong (executor and trustee of the estate of Chye You, deceased) [2021] SGHC 83 (“the GD”). The appellant, Mr Chye Seng Kait, and the respondent, Mr Chye Seng Fong, are brothers. The respondent is the executor of the estate (“the Estate”) of their late father (“the Testator”), while the appellant is a beneficiary of the Estate, pursuant to the Testator’s will (“the Will”).

During his lifetime, the Testator had been a property developer. In 2009, he suffered a stroke, and then, sometime before 2010, from an onset of dementia. The Testator passed away in 2015, and was survived by his wife (who has since passed away), the appellant, the respondent, and three daughters, one of whom, Ms Chye Moi June, features prominently in this dispute.

A grant of probate dated 30 May 2016 was issued to the respondent on 18 August 2016. The schedule of assets annexed to the Grant of Probate (the “Schedule of Assets”) valued the father’s assets at $1,741,314.12. Of these assets, two bank accounts feature in this dispute: a DBS bank account opened on 8 August 2006, in the joint names of the Testator and Ms Chye Moi June (the “DBS Joint Account”); and an OCBC bank account opened on 20 February 1999, in the joint names of the Testator and Ms Chye Moi June (the “OCBC Joint Account”).

We refer to these accounts collectively as the “CMJ Joint Accounts”.

The appellant was not satisfied with the Schedule of Assets. Correspondence was then exchanged between the respective parties’ solicitors at the time. On 7 August 2017, the respondent’s then solicitors, CH Partners, sent an email to the appellant attaching a statement of account (the “Statement of Account”) which set out the Estate’s assets and the proposed distribution of those assets. In that same email, CH Partners invited the appellant to come to their office to countersign the Statement of Account and to collect a cheque for $72,451.34 (“the Cheque”), being the appellant’s share of the residuary estate. However, the appellant did not agree to the Statement of Account and did not collect the Cheque.

On 25 April 2018, after discontinuing an initial suit that had been commenced in the Family Justice Courts, the appellant commenced the present proceedings in the High Court. We summarise the appellant’s claims against the respondent as they stood at the end of trial and as they were advanced before us, as follows: First, the respondent had failed to take in the CMJ Joint Accounts which, the appellant argues, was held by Ms Chye Moi June on resulting trust for the Estate. Further, the respondent had failed to make any inquiries at all or failed to make sufficient inquiries into two allegedly wrongful transactions: (i) a withdrawal of $200,000 from the DBS Joint Account in 2007 (“the 2007 Transaction”); and (ii) a withdrawal of $15,300 from the OCBC Joint Account in 2014 (“the 2014 Transaction”). Second, the respondent had failed to inquire into the division of the proceeds from the sale of a property at Killiney Road (“the Killiney Property”) which had been held by the Testator and Ms Chye Moi June as tenants in common in equal shares. The appellant takes issue with the equal division of the sale proceeds, claiming that the Testator held a 67% share of the Killiney Property in equity. Third, the respondent had wrongfully deducted his legal expenses from the Estate. Fourth, the respondent had failed to distribute the Estate’s assets promptly and fairly by imposing a condition on the appellant’s collection of the Cheque and stating that he would use the Estate’s funds to address any further allegations from the appellant.

We address each of these in turn.

The CMJ Joint Accounts

In relation to the CMJ Joint Accounts, we agree with the Judge that the beneficial interest in the CMJ Joint Accounts (strictly speaking, the choses in action against the respective banks) was not held by the Estate, but was held by Ms Chye Moi June by virtue of cl 2 of the Will. That provision reads, as relevant:

… I further declare that any account held by me with any other person(s) jointly in any financial institution shall also belong to such joint account holder(s) absolutely by virtue of the right of survivorship.

It is common ground that during the Testator’s lifetime, the beneficial interest in the CMJ Joint Accounts was held entirely by the Testator, on the basis of a resulting trust arising over the accounts. It is also common ground that after the Testator’s death, Ms Chye Moi June held the legal right to the CMJ Joint Accounts by virtue of the right of survivorship. In this context, we find that cl 2 of the Will expresses the clear intention that the right of survivorship arising from the legal position of joint tenancy was to operate instead of any equitable intervention upon the Testator’s death. In other words, whatever the situation was during his lifetime, it was the Testator’s intention that the right of survivorship should apply to all the bank accounts held in joint names, and that the surviving joint tenant should have absolute ownership of those accounts.

We do not find the appellant’s counterarguments convincing. The appellant argues that if a gift was intended, the phrase “the right of survivorship” should not have been included. However, the above analysis shows why the inclusion of that phrase was entirely sensible and reasonable – the purpose of cl 2 was not to make a bequest of the beneficial...