Questions, answered properly

Not always. A private company holds its AGM within six months of its financial year end unless it is exempted from holding one. Whether the exemption applies turns on conditions in the Companies Act, so we test your company against them instead of assuming. Being excused the meeting does not excuse the filing.

Yes. The annual return is a separate obligation and it still reaches ACRA within seven months of the financial year end. The exemption removes the meeting, not the filing. Financial statements, in XBRL where required, and current registers of members, directors and controllers are still needed behind it.

For many small private companies, yes. Where every member agrees, the business is dealt with in writing and no meeting is held. The resolutions are drafted, circulated for signature and kept in the minute book, which is the record ACRA or your auditor would ask to see.

The company and its directors are in breach, and the annual return runs late behind it, because that deadline counts from the same financial year end. We would rather not quote penalty figures here, since they turn on how late the filing is. The fix is to deal with both together and stop the gap widening.

Directors approve the financial statements and sign the directors' statement. Members pass the resolutions, either at the meeting or in writing. The company secretary keeps the minutes and the registers, and the sole director alone is not permitted to fill that role, which one-person companies often miss.

Within seven months of your financial year end. The AGM, where one is held, falls within six months of the same date, so the two deadlines sit a month apart. Both count from the year end rather than from the date you filed last year, which is where companies with a changed year end slip.

It reports your company's details as ACRA holds them, the officers and the members, and the financial statements where those have to be filed, in XBRL format where that is required. It confirms the record rather than creating it, which is why the registers behind it have to be correct first.

Yes, and the annual return is where it surfaces. The filing reports what the register says, so an undocumented share transfer either goes on file wrong or stops the return. Putting it right means finding the transfer documents and board approvals from the time, and that gets harder the older the gap is.

It depends on the company. Financial statements are filed with ACRA in XBRL format where required, and not every company falls into that group. We confirm which treatment applies to yours against the accounts for the year, rather than preparing XBRL for the sake of it.

No. A private company exempted from holding an AGM still files its annual return with ACRA within seven months of the financial year end. The exemption covers the meeting only. Members still need the financial statements, and the registers still have to be current on the day the return goes in.

No, and nobody honest does. The bank runs its own checks on the company, the owners and the activity, then decides. What we control is the quality of the file, which removes the avoidable reasons for a decline. If one bank says no, we go through the reasons before approaching another.

Two things more than any others. A business description that fails to say clearly who pays you and from where, and an ownership chain that stops at a corporate shareholder with no documents for the people above it. Both are cheap to fix before submission and slow to fix afterwards.

It depends on the bank. Some accept a video call with a director, some require a director to attend in person, and digital banks tend to be the most flexible. We tell you which requirement applies before you apply, so you are not booking flights on a guess.

No. Expede prepares the documents, makes the introduction and answers the bank's questions about the paperwork. The account is opened by the bank in your company's name, and the signatories are your people. We hold no mandate and no access over your account.

It depends on where your customers pay from and what the account has to do. A company billing in Singapore dollars has different needs from one collecting card payments in four currencies. We shortlist rather than push one name at everybody, and the choice stays yours.

Xero records what you tell it and nothing more. The software pulls in bank lines, and somebody still has to decide what each one is, reconcile the accounts and attach the documents. Companies that skip that part arrive at year end with a file full of uncoded transactions and a bill to sort it out.

No filing is due for a month of bookkeeping, so nothing goes late on its own. The deadlines that bite are ECI within three months of your financial year end, Form C-S or Form C by 30 November, and the quarterly GST return if you are registered. Each one reads from the ledger, so a year of missing records turns into a filing problem.

Yes, after reviewing the existing Xero file. Taking on someone else's coding without looking at it is how errors get inherited and then repeated. Where the file is in poor shape, the cleanup is quoted separately from the monthly fee. You keep ownership of the Xero subscription either way.

It gets recorded as a director's loan or a reimbursement, and both need evidence. A payment with no invoice behind it is not deductible against the 17% corporate tax rate, and if the company is GST-registered the input tax claim goes with it. Use the company card and the problem disappears.

No. This is company bookkeeping and the filings that come out of it. Personal income tax for directors is separate work, so ask us directly rather than assuming the monthly fee covers it. Being told late that something was never included helps nobody.

Often not. A company issuing four invoices a month, with one product and money in the bank, needs accurate bookkeeping and nothing above it. This work earns its fee when decisions start getting expensive: hiring ahead of revenue, pricing a second product, raising money, or watching cash tighten without knowing what is causing it.

Bookkeeping and tax record what has happened and report it on statutory deadlines. This work looks forward and has no filing attached. Each needs the other, since a forecast built on a ledger nobody reconciled is fiction with decimal places in it.

A senior person with the experience to sit in a board meeting, supported by the team handling the monthly detail. You are told who that is before signing, because a retainer that arrives with an unnamed resource behind it is a different product from the one described on this page.

Less than running it yourself, more than none. Expect a monthly review conversation, with questions in between when something needs a founder's answer. Decisions stay with you. You get the numbers, a recommendation and the reasoning behind it, then you choose.

No, though the work is easier when the ledger is current and on Xero. Books kept elsewhere and kept well are fine to work from. Books months behind have to be brought up to date first, because a forecast built on guesswork is worse than having no forecast at all.

Form C-S or Form C is due 30 November. Before that, estimated chargeable income is filed within three months of your financial year end, unless your company qualifies for the waiver. They are two separate filings on two separate dates, and meeting one does nothing for the other.

Relief of 75% on the first S$100,000 of chargeable income and 50% on the next S$100,000, for the first three years of assessment. Property development and investment holding companies are excluded. Set against the 17% corporate tax rate, that is the difference between a manageable first tax bill and a painful one.

The relief attaches to the first three years of assessment. Once those years have been assessed, a claim in year four has nowhere to go, because the window it belongs to has closed. This is the most expensive thing a founder loses by not asking, and it goes quietly.

Yes. A dormant or loss-making company still has a filing obligation, and the return is what puts losses on record for carrying forward against later profits. Skipping it because no tax is payable leaves you with a compliance problem and no losses to use when you finally need them.

The Comply package covers financial statements, XBRL where required, ECI and Form C-S. Monthly bookkeeping is not part of it. Tax work still needs a ledger to read from, so if nobody is keeping your records through the year, that is a separate conversation about the Complete package.

Electronic signing is widely used for company documents here, but it does not stretch to every document type, and some counterparties insist on paper whatever the position is. We give no blanket yes. Each item in your pack is checked, and anything needing wet ink is flagged before it goes out for signature.

It depends on the document, and sometimes on who is receiving it. Certain instruments sit outside electronic signing, and individual banks and registries take their own line. We go through your pack, mark those items and arrange paper signing for them, so you are not turned away at a counter.

No. Each signer receives a link by email that opens the documents assigned to them. Nothing is installed and no account is created. That matters most for an overseas shareholder who signs once a year and has no reason to keep another login.

No. Expede Sign covers the corporate documents we prepare for you, which means resolutions, consents and engagement paperwork. Commercial contracts, leases and employment agreements sit outside it. Use a service built for those, and keep the company records and their signing trail here.

It is stored with your company records together with the record of who signed and when. Resolutions feed the minute book and the statutory registers, so the signed copy and the register entry are made at the same time, rather than months later when somebody asks for proof.

Most companies file quarterly on the F5, covering three months of sales and purchases, with a filing date and a payment date attached. Some companies sit on different periods, so check what IRAS assigned you at registration instead of assuming your quarters match everyone else's.

IRAS acts on late returns, and the tax stays owed either way. The money was collected from your customers as GST, so there is no argument about affordability to make. Where the books are the reason for the delay, fix the books, because the same problem comes round again in three months.

Usually because the document behind it will not support the claim. A valid tax invoice in the company's name is the starting point, and a card receipt, a bank line or a supplier statement is not the same thing. Costs that were never business costs come out as well, whatever paperwork sits behind them.

No. The return is arithmetic on your ledger, and putting our name to figures from records we have not kept is not something we do. Where you want the filing handled, the bookkeeping comes with it, which is why both sit inside the same package.

Yes. Registration carries a filing obligation whether or not there is anything to report, and a nil return still goes in. Where turnover has fallen well below the S$1 million threshold, deregistration is worth a conversation, though it comes with conditions rather than being a form you tick.

Once taxable turnover passes S$1 million over a 12 month period, or as soon as you reasonably expect it will. The second half catches people out. Signing a contract that takes you past the threshold starts the clock from that point, before any of the money has arrived in your account.

It depends on who buys from you. Selling to GST-registered businesses, the 9% you add is reclaimed by your customer and you recover input tax on your own costs, so registration helps. Selling to consumers, that 9% raises your price or eats your margin. Heavy spending before revenue starts pushes the answer the other way.

Liability runs from the date registration was due, not from the day you applied. GST is owed on sales made from that date, and few customers will settle an invoice for tax issued months after the event, so it comes out of your own pocket. Disclose it with the figures prepared rather than waiting to be asked.

No. You charge GST from the effective date on your registration, not from the day you applied. Tax invoices issued before that date are wrong and have to be corrected. Set your pricing and your invoice template in advance so the switch happens on the right day, once.

Deregistration exists, and it is not automatic. Voluntary registrants also take on conditions about how long they stay registered, which is one reason to weigh the choice properly at the start rather than treating registration as a free option you drop later.

No. The incorporation is filed electronically and signatures are collected remotely. A bank is a different matter. Some banks accept a video interview, others want a director to appear in person, and that condition belongs to the bank rather than to ACRA. We tell you which banks ask for what before you apply.

Yes. A Singapore private limited company is allowed to be owned entirely by foreign individuals or by a foreign parent company. The resident director requirement is separate from ownership, so you keep all the shares and still need at least one director ordinarily resident in Singapore.

Only if nobody involved in the company is ordinarily resident in Singapore. The rule asks for one resident director, so a single qualifying person covers it. Founders relocating on an Employment Pass often need a nominee for the gap between incorporation and the pass being approved, then drop the arrangement.

Longer than the incorporation, and no honest provider gives you a fixed date. Applications with overseas directors go through deeper checks. Two things hold them up most: a vague description of what the business does, and gaps in the ownership chain above a corporate shareholder. Fix both before applying.

Corporate income tax is 17% of chargeable income. A new company usually qualifies for the Start-up Tax Exemption, worth 75% relief on the first S$100,000 and 50% on the next S$100,000 for the first three years of assessment. GST registration becomes compulsory once taxable turnover passes S$1 million over 12 months.

Yes. One must be appointed within six months of incorporation, and the role is not one the sole director fills alone. A single-director company therefore needs a second person in the secretary seat. Most founders in that position use an external named secretary rather than asking a family member to take on the statutory duties.

It follows your financial year end. A private company holds its AGM within six months of the year end and files the annual return with ACRA within seven months, unless it is exempt from holding an AGM. ECI goes to IRAS within three months of the year end, unless the company qualifies for the waiver.

Any month is allowed, and the choice sets every deadline that follows. A December year end puts your AGM and annual return in the middle of the next year. Pick a year end away from your busiest trading month so the accounts and filings do not land at the worst possible time. Decide before the incorporation form goes in.

There is no single right answer, and an even split is the most common source of later trouble, because nothing breaks a deadlock. Whatever you agree, write it into the constitution and the register of members, and settle what happens if one founder leaves. Changing holdings later means transfer documents, resolutions and another filing.

Corporate income tax is 17% of chargeable income. A new company usually qualifies for the Start-up Tax Exemption, which gives 75% relief on the first S$100,000 of chargeable income and 50% on the next S$100,000, for the first three years of assessment. Property development and investment holding companies are excluded.

Because the nominee is a real director with real duties under the Companies Act, and stays liable for the company's filings and conduct while appointed. If a company is abandoned or a filing obligation is ignored, the nominee is the person ACRA looks at. The deposit covers that exposure and is returned under the conditions in the engagement letter.

No. The nominee has no signing authority over trading decisions, approves no payments and holds no bank mandate. You keep the shares, the bank access and the running of the business. The role exists to meet the resident director requirement and stops there.

Until someone connected to the company is ordinarily resident in Singapore. For founders relocating, that is usually the gap between incorporation and an Employment Pass being approved. Where there is no plan to place anyone here, the appointment runs year to year and the fee is annual.

No. A co-founder or employee who is ordinarily resident here is a director in the ordinary sense, involved in running the business. The nominee, by contrast, holds the statutory seat and stays out of operations. If someone on your team already lives in Singapore, you do not need a nominee at all, and we will say so.

It is returned once the resignation is filed with ACRA and the filings covering the appointment period are dealt with. The engagement letter lists the conditions in full. An overdue annual return from that period is the usual reason a return is held up, so keeping filings current is in your own interest.

No. CPF contributions apply to Singapore Citizens and Permanent Residents. Employees on work passes sit outside CPF and their pay is calculated differently. Residency status is recorded for each employee at setup, and a change of status during the year has to be picked up in the month it takes effect.

IR8A reports what your company paid each employee over the year, and the employer files it by 1 March. Employees rely on those figures for their own tax returns. Reporting them wrongly pushes your problem onto your staff, which is a poor use of the goodwill you earned by paying them properly.

Yes, itemised, every month, showing gross pay, deductions and the amount paid. Employees compare payslips with each other, and the first sign of a payroll problem is usually somebody asking why a deduction changed. A clear payslip settles most of those questions before they reach you.

It gets noticed the same day, because staff check their own pay. Corrections are made inside the same month where possible, with CPF adjusted in the same submission. Leaving a fix until the following month doubles the number of people watching it and turns one query into several.

Yes, quoted separately. The Complete package covers up to five. Beyond that, the fee depends on headcount and how variable the pay is, since commission, overtime and hourly staff take more work each month than a fixed salary run for the same number of people.

No, and the distinction matters. The Complete package includes the bookkeeping, the management accounts, GST filing, payroll for up to five staff and everything in Comply. Treating it as a bookkeeping rate and comparing it against a bookkeeping-only quote gives you the wrong answer.

You should not. A company with no transactions has almost no bookkeeping, and the Comply package covers what a dormant company still owes, which is the secretary, the registered office, the annual return and the tax filings. Ask for Comply instead.

Xero. The books are kept there, bank feeds are connected during setup and you keep your own login, so the records are yours whatever happens to the relationship. If you are already on Xero, moving the file across is simpler than starting again.

It is quoted separately from the monthly fee, because catch up work is a different job. The price depends on how many periods are open, whether the bank statements and invoices exist, and whether a tax return has already gone in using figures that now look wrong.

Once taxable turnover passes S$1 million over a 12 month period, or as soon as you reasonably expect it will. The second half catches people out. Signing a contract that takes you over the line starts the clock, which is why the books need to be current rather than reconstructed in March.

Within six months of incorporation. Most founders deal with it at formation, because the appointment also settles who is preparing the AGM documents and the annual return later in the year. Leaving it to the sixth month means finding a secretary while the first filing deadlines are already moving towards you.

Not where you are the only director, because the role is not one the sole director fills alone. With a second director or another suitable appointee, an in-house appointment is possible. The filings still have to go in on time, so the question is whether that person has the time and the knowledge.

A named secretary, the AGM documents, the annual return, the statutory registers including the RORC, routine resolutions, the registered office with mail scanning, and the tax filings in Comply. A private company must hold its AGM within six months of financial year end and file the annual return within seven.

Dormant is not the same as exempt. The annual return is still due within seven months of financial year end, the registers still have to be accurate, and the secretary still has to be in place. What dormancy removes is the bookkeeping, which is why Comply rather than Complete is the right package.

ACRA sets the consequences and they fall on the directors, not on the firm that forgot. We print no penalty figures here because ACRA sets them and they are revised. The practical answer is that notices arrive through the registered office and Corppass, so both need to reach someone who acts.

Not for the registration itself. The incorporation fee, with the ACRA fee inside it, is the same as a local founder pays. The difference is what a foreign founder usually needs alongside it, which is a resident director and a Singapore registered office, each priced on its own.

No. The requirement the Companies Act sets is at least one director ordinarily resident in Singapore. Ownership is a separate matter from that seat, and a company owned entirely from overseas is ordinary. Anyone telling you to hand shares to a local resident is describing something the law does not ask for.

Until someone connected to the company is ordinarily resident here. For a founder relocating, that is the stretch between incorporation and an Employment Pass being approved. Where nobody is being placed in Singapore, the appointment renews year after year and the fee is annual.

No. The registered office has to be a Singapore address, open to the public at least three hours on each business day, and a PO box does not qualify. Filing deadlines and notices reach you through that address and through Corppass, so it has to be one somebody reads.

The registration, then a monthly package, then the nominee if you need one. Comply suits a company with nothing to book, Complete fits once there are transactions, GST and staff. The nominee is quoted after due diligence.

Yes. The government charge for registering the company is inside our incorporation fee, not added at the end. Where a separate ACRA charge arises later, such as lodging a change of officers, it is passed on at cost and shown on the invoice as what it is.

Anything after registration. The company secretary, the registered office, the annual return, the tax filings and the books are ongoing work and sit in the Comply package or the Complete package. Bespoke constitution drafting is also separate.

Not on day one, but close to it. A company secretary must be appointed within six months of incorporation, and the role is not one the sole director fills alone. Most founders settle it at formation rather than setting a calendar reminder and hoping.

Usually because the ACRA fee sits outside the headline, or the first year of secretarial work is bundled at a low rate and the renewal is where the money is. Ask for the ACRA fee, the year one total and the year two total, then compare those three numbers.

For a company with no trading activity, the Comply package covers the secretary, the registered office, the annual return and the tax filings. A trading company needing monthly books, GST and payroll sits in Complete.

Because the nominee is a real director with real duties under the Companies Act, and stays liable for the company's filings and conduct while appointed. If a company is abandoned or a filing obligation is ignored, the nominee is the person ACRA looks at. The deposit covers that exposure.

Yes, under the conditions written into the engagement letter, once the resignation is filed with ACRA and the filings covering the appointment period are dealt with. An overdue annual return from that period is the usual reason a return gets held up, so keeping filings current is in your own interest.

Because a published number would be wrong for most companies. The fee tracks what the business does, where its owners sit and how long the seat is needed. A dormant holding company and a cross border payments business would pay the same on a price list, which serves neither of them.

No. The nominee holds no bank mandate, approves no payments and takes no part in trading decisions. You keep the shares, the bank access and the running of the business. The role exists to meet the resident director requirement and stops at the edge of it.

Appoint a director who is ordinarily resident in Singapore. That is usually you once an Employment Pass is approved, or a co-founder or employee already living here. Give notice, the nominee resigns, ACRA is updated and the deposit is returned under the engagement letter terms.

Payroll for up to five staff sits inside the Complete package. There is no standalone payroll rate, so tell us the headcount and what else you need and we will quote. For a company with books to keep anyway, the package is the cheaper route.

The fee is adjusted from the month that person joins. Nothing is backdated and nothing is charged for a headcount you no longer have. Tell us before the pay run rather than after it, because a person added late gets paid late, and that conversation is worse than this one.

CPF contributions apply to Singapore Citizens and Permanent Residents. A team with both locals and pass holders needs both treatments handled correctly in the same run, and the split has to be right in the payroll records as well as in the IR8A returns filed by 1 March.

No. If nobody is being paid a salary, there is nothing to run, and paying for payroll inside a package you do not otherwise need makes little sense. A company with no trading and no staff usually belongs in Comply until that changes.

IR8A returns are due 1 March each year. They are prepared from the payroll records, which is why sloppy monthly runs turn into a scramble in February. Where payroll and bookkeeping sit with the same firm, the figures reconcile before they are filed rather than afterwards.

Not as a standard service. The Comply package includes the address, the mail scanning, the named company secretary, the annual return and the tax filings. If you want the address alone, ask, but check first whether you already need the rest of what Comply covers.

No. The registered office must be a Singapore address that is open to the public at least three hours on each business day, and a PO box does not meet that. The requirement exists so that documents delivered to the company reach a place where a person is present.

It has to meet the same test, which is a Singapore address open to the public at least three hours on each business day. The address is also recorded at ACRA as the company's registered office, so consider who ends up knowing where you live before you use it.

It is scanned and sent through to you. Anything with a deadline attached, such as a notice from ACRA or IRAS, is flagged rather than added to a monthly batch. Notices also reach you through Corppass, so keeping that access working is worth as much as the address itself.

Because it is where the consequences arrive. Filing deadlines and notices reach companies through the registered office and through Corppass, and directors who never saw the letter are still the people answering for the filing. An address nobody reads is worse than no address at all.

MOM sets a minimum qualifying salary that rises with age and differs by sector, and it is revised periodically. We deliberately print no figure here, because a salary number on a website goes stale and people budget against it. The current minimum is checked against your candidate before anything is submitted.

COMPASS is the framework MOM uses to assess Employment Pass applications, taking account of the candidate and the employer. We name it rather than quote thresholds, because those are revised. Send the candidate details and the company profile and you get a considered view before filing, not a promise.

No, and treat anyone who does with suspicion. The decision belongs to MOM. What we control is whether the application is accurate, whether the candidate meets the current requirements before filing, and how fast a query from MOM is answered. Where a case looks weak, we say so first.

No. MOM charges its own fees for the application and for issuing the pass, and those go to MOM. Our quote covers preparing and running the application. Both sets of numbers are set out before you commit, so nothing arrives as a surprise on an invoice.

Yes. An Employment Pass is tied to an employer, so the Singapore company is incorporated first. That creates a gap, because every Singapore company needs a director ordinarily resident here, and a founder waiting on a pass is not yet resident. A nominee director usually covers that stretch.

No. The registered office must be a Singapore address open to the public at least three hours on each business day, and a PO box satisfies neither half of that. ACRA needs a place where documents are served and records inspected, which a mailbox does not provide.

No, and think hard before you do. The registered office appears on your ACRA business profile, which anyone is free to buy, so your home address becomes public and stays that way. A service address keeps your home off the register, and letters still reach you by scan on the day they arrive.

They are opened, scanned and sent to you, with the paper kept on file. Notices reach companies through the registered office and through Corppass, so both sources are checked together. A tax assessment or a compliance notice carrying a response date is the reason speed matters here.

No. The registered office is one part of the Comply package. The same fee covers mail scanning, a named company secretary, AGM documents, the annual return, statutory registers, financial statements and XBRL, ECI and Form C-S. Nobody sells you the address by itself.

A change of registered office is filed with ACRA, and the recorded opening hours go in with it. Your bank and IRAS need telling separately, since they keep their own records. Keep the old address live until the filing is through, so nothing lands at a place nobody is checking.

MOM sets a minimum qualifying salary that rises with age and differs by sector, and the figure is revised periodically. Any number printed on a website ages badly, so the current requirement is checked against your specific candidate before anything is drafted. Meeting the minimum is a starting point rather than an approval.

The framework MOM uses to assess Employment Pass applications. It scores the candidate and the employer together, taking in things like qualifications, salary against peers in the sector, and the make-up of your existing workforce. We run the assessment for your company and the individual before applying, since the thresholds are revised and both sides affect the result.

MOM sets the pace and publishes its own processing guidance, which changes. The parts that add weeks sit on your side: verification of a qualification from an overseas institution, and documents arriving one at a time. Assemble those before submission and you remove the delay you own.

No. Approval is MOM's decision and nobody outside MOM is in a position to promise it. What we do is check eligibility first, write the role and the case properly, and tell you plainly when an application looks weak, before you have paid fees and made someone a job offer.

Yes, and it is examined more closely than an ordinary hire. MOM looks at what the company does, its paid-up capital, its hiring plans and whether the role is genuine. Sequence matters too, because the company generally has to exist first, which is why founders often need a resident director to cover the gap.