Most Singapore businesses assume the supplier always issues the tax invoice. In a handful of industries, that assumption is wrong by design. Under a self-billing arrangement approved by the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS), it is the GST-registered customer, not the supplier, who prepares the tax invoice and hands a copy to the supplier [...]
Most Singapore GST conversations about manufacturing companies start and end with the Major Exporter Scheme (MES). It is the scheme every accountant mentions first, and for good reason: it is broad and covers a wide range of import-heavy, export-heavy trading businesses. But MES is not the only GST relief on offer, and for a specific [...]
Most Singapore companies treat GST compliance as a quarterly filing exercise: get the numbers right, submit the return, move on. The Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) has a separate, voluntary track for businesses that want to go further, called the Assisted Compliance Assurance Programme, or ACAP. It rewards companies that build a genuinely robust [...]
Discovering an error in a corporate tax return that has already been filed is an uncomfortable moment for any business owner. The instinctive reaction is often to hope the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) does not notice. In practice, that instinct is exactly backwards: IRAS operates a Voluntary Disclosure Programme (VDP) that rewards companies [...]
Every month, thousands of Singapore businesses pay overseas technology companies — Google, Meta (Facebook), Zoom, LinkedIn, Dropbox, Adobe, and countless others — for digital services. Most of these businesses never stop to consider whether GST applies to these payments. In many cases, it does. Under Singapore's reverse charge mechanism, introduced from 1 January 2020 and [...]
For many business owners in Singapore, Goods and Services Tax (GST) registration is a milestone that raises a host of questions. When is registration compulsory? Is there any benefit to registering voluntarily? What are the compliance obligations that come with being GST-registered? And with the new InvoiceNow requirements rolling out from April 2026, what should [...]
It is highly recommended to initiate early preparations to seamlessly transition to the new GST rate of 9% effective from January 1, 2024. This involves potential adjustments to your point-of-sale, invoicing, accounting systems, and other operational aspects, including updating price displays to reflect the revised rate. The Budget In the Budget announcement of 2022, [...]