20 things you ought to know about the Statutory Compliances in Singapore!
Lately we ( CBO ) received quite a number of enquiries about incorporating a new company in Singapore.
These enquiries came from first time start-up entrepreneurs who want to venture out on their own due to various reasons.
However, they have the common question – what are the various statutory Compliances in Singapore they have to do starting from incorporating a new company up to company closure in Singapore and how a good Corporate Services firm can assist them in all these Compliances throughout their whole journey?
Let me use my firm as an example to walk you through on the comprehensive “cradle to grave” services a good Corporate Services firm can help you for the benefit of those first-time business owners …
Here we go…
1. If you are thinking of starting a business and incorporate a private limited company, it is advisable for you to do up a Shareholders’ Agreement. My team can assist you in our Corporate Advisory service.
2. You would then need to incorporate a company with ACRA. There are altogether about 17 steps in incorporating a company in Singapore – 4 steps in Pre-Incorporation and 13 steps in Post-incorporation – to be compliance with the Companies’ Act and ACRA’s requirement. My team can assist you in our Company Formation service.
3. It is a Companies’ Act’s requirement for you to appoint a qualified Corporate Secretary to help manage your corporate governance matters as required by ACRA. My team can assist in our Corporate Secretarial services.
4. ACRA requires proper Accounting records to be maintained in the company, & IRAS requires these records to be stored for up to 5 years, hence you would need Bookkeeping service, which my team can assist (question is whether you want monthly, quarterly or annual bookkeeping service)
5. When you start hiring staff, Ministry of Manpower (MOM) requires you to issue Key Employment Terms (we call KETs) in your Contract of Service, my team can assist you in our HR Admin for Staff On-boarding service.
6. Every month-end, you would need issue itemized pay-slips to your hired staff & then submit their monthly pension contributions to the CPF Board, my team can assist you in our Payroll Outsourcing service.
7. If you hire a foreign staff, you would need to apply for either a Foreign Worker’s Permit or an Employment Pass, my team can assist in our HR Admin for On-boarding service.
8. If your hired foreign staff resigns, you would need to do tax clearances for him with IRAS, my team can assist in our HR Admin on foreign staff Exit service.
9. If you would like introduce Employee Share Schemes (ESS) to retain your loyal & good staff to help you grow your business, my team can assist you in Adopting, Issuance and Conversion of your ESS in our Corporate Advisory service.
10. At Calendar year end, IRAS requires you to perform Employee Remuneration Reporting (we call IR8A submission), my team can assist you in our Payroll Year-End service.
11. Upon fiscal year end, ACRA requires a Director to have someone prepare Annual Unaudited Financial Statements, which comprises Directors’ Report, Profit & Loss Statement, Balance Sheet, Cash Flow Statement & Notes To Accounts, to be done per Financial Reporting Standards of Singapore ( we call FRS ). My team can assist you in this in our Accounting Year-End service.
12. Within 3 months after your fiscal year end close, you would need to submit an ECI (Estimated Chargeable Income) to IRAS, my team can assist in our Year-end Tax service.
13. Within 6 months after fiscal year end close you as Director of company needs to conduct a Shareholders’ Annual General Meeting (we call AGM) to accept the financial statements, approve director’s fees etc. My team will be assisting you as your appointed Corporate Secretary.
14. Within 1 month after AGM, you need file an Annual Report in XBRL format to ACRA, my team can assist you in our Accounting and Corporate Secretarial services.
15. By end of Nov of following year after fiscal year end close, you need file final Tax Computation and Form C to IRAS. My team can assist you in our Year-end Tax service.
16. If you your annual revenue is less than S$1 million and you would like to register for GST voluntarily to help you reduce your operational costs by claiming back all your Input GST, or that your annual revenue exceeds S$1 million and you are compulsory to register for GST, my team can assist you in GST registration in our Tax Service.
17. Once you are GST registered, you would need to submit GST returns every calendar quarter as required by IRAS, my team can assist you in our Tax Service on GST.
18. When you want to claim PIC from IRAS either in Cash Payout or Enhanced Allowance, my team can assist you in our Tax Service.
19. My team can assist you in Corporate Secretarial matters, just name a few here :
* You would need a Director’s Resolution for submitting Annual Return.
* You also need to have a First Director’s Resolution to open new bank account, appoint company secretary, fix first fiscal year end, etc.
* You would need to have a routine Director’s Resolution for other matters (like change of Registered Address).
* Special Resolution refers to occasions like change of company name, capital reduction, wind up, etc.
20. In the event you would like to either Wind up or Strike off your company, you would need to go through a tedious and lengthy process of obtaining various clearances IRAS, CPF Board, MOM, ACRA, etc. My team can assist you in our comprehensive Company Liquidation service.
Hope the above gives you a good feel of the various statutory Compliances you would need follow in the normal course of your entrepreneurship in Singapore.
However, you may be pleased to know that we will be by your side to go through this wonderful journey together.
Hope the above helps.
Good Luck!
If you need help, feel free to contact us at :
(O) +65 63851011
(M) +65 90880669
