Workright Guide on Employment Laws: Employee Rights and Examples

How this guide is organised

The January 2026 Workright guide explains the Employment Act, written employment terms, salary records, hours, leave and CPF. It distinguishes employees working under a contract of service from independent contractors. Its language editions are available together below.

Writing down the employment agreement

Written KETs apply to covered employees hired on or after 1 April 2016 for a continuous period of at least 14 days. Issue them within 14 days after employment starts. Common terms can be in a handbook or intranet, with individual terms supplied separately.

General coverage and exclusions

The Employment Act governs employees under a contract of service, including local and foreign, full-time, part-time, temporary and contract employees paid by hour, day, month or piece. Work below 35 hours a week falls under the part-time regulations. Seafarers, domestic workers and statutory-board employees/civil servants are excluded; their contracts and other applicable legislation govern them. Foreign work-pass employees also have protections and employer obligations under EFMA. The term-contract advisory is relevant to fixed-term staff.

Part 4 salary thresholds

Part 4 adds working-hours, overtime and rest-day protections. It covers workmen with monthly basic salary at most S$4,500, and covered non-workmen at most S$2,600. It excludes managers and executives. Basic salary excludes overtime, bonus, AWS, productivity incentives, special-expense reimbursement and every allowance.

Managers, executives and workmen

Manager/executive functions include hiring, discipline, termination, performance/reward decisions, policy formulation and business management. Tertiary-qualified specialists with comparable terms include lawyers, chartered accountants, doctors and dentists. Workmen mainly perform manual labour, including artisans/apprentices, passenger-vehicle operation or maintenance, and supervisors doing manual work over half their time. Statutory examples include cleaners, construction workers, labourers, machine operators/assemblers, metal or machinery workers, train/bus/lorry/van drivers, train/bus inspectors and piece-rate workers at employer premises. Seafarers and domestic workers remain excluded.

What salary includes

Salary is remuneration, including allowances, for work under a contract of service. It excludes accommodation and utilities in kind, employer pension or provident-fund contributions, travelling allowances, work-expense reimbursements, discharge or retirement gratuities, and retrenchment benefits. Singapore has no single general minimum wage; agreed salary follows negotiation with the employer or union, while applicable wage requirements must still be checked separately.

Payment dates

Employees covered by the Employment Act must be paid at least monthly. Ordinary salary is due within 7 days after the salary period ends; overtime is due within 14 days. Commission timing and calculation follow the contract, established policy or practice.

Tax clearance and payment method

When a foreign employee leaves employment, the employer must withhold all monies due, including salary and leave pay, for tax clearance for up to 30 days after notifying the Comptroller of Income Tax. Salary should be paid on a working day during working hours at the workplace or another agreed place. Bank transfers are permitted; a cheque counts as payment only after it clears.

Payslips, records and disputes

Since 1 April 2016 employers must issue itemised payslips and retain detailed employment and salary records for employees covered by the Employment Act. Non-payment of salary is an offence. Ask the employer about late payment and restoration of the regular schedule; if unpaid, seek TADM advice through Ask TADM or an advisory appointment, file a claim through TADM eServices, or approach the union. File early because claim amounts and filing periods are limited.

Who receives a slip and when

Since 1 April 2016 all Employment Act-covered employees must receive itemised pay slips. Issue with salary; if that is not possible, within three working days of payment. On termination/dismissal issue with outstanding salary. Electronic, paper and handwritten formats are allowed. Multiple payments in a month may be consolidated only if every payment since the previous slip is detailed. Omit genuinely inapplicable items, such as overtime fields for an employee without overtime.

Retain issued slips

Retain the latest two years for current employees. For former employees keep the final two years for one year after employment ends. The official blank template and further tools/workshops/advisory resources are linked.

Coverage and definitions

These statutory limits concern employees covered by Employment Act Part 4; managers and executives are excluded. Other employees rely on their contractual terms for these matters. A week runs Monday to Sunday. Working time covers assigned duties and excludes permitted meal or rest intervals, which the employer need not pay.

Breaks and contractual hours

Normally a break is required before more than six consecutive working hours. Work requiring an uninterrupted stretch of up to eight hours needs meal breaks totalling at least 45 minutes. Normal contractual limits differ by weekly pattern.

Averaging examples and consent

A 40/48/40-hour weekly pattern produces 44-hour averages for weeks 1–2 and 2–3. A 40/44/48/40 pattern produces 44-hour averages for weeks 1–3 and 2–4. A non-shift employee agreeing to work up to 12 hours a day within the three-week average needs written consent, an explanation of Employment Act sections 38 and 40, and information about daily hours, weekly working days and the rest day.

Overtime eligibility, rates and payment

Overtime is work beyond normal contractual hours, excluding breaks. Eligible non-workmen have monthly basic pay no higher than S$2,600; eligible workmen no higher than S$4,500. Workmen mainly perform manual labour. The non-workman calculation is capped at S$2,600, or S$13.60 hourly. Pay at least 1.5 times the hourly basic rate within 14 days after the salary period ends. Two overtime hours at the capped rate produce S$13.60 × 1.5 × 2 = S$40.80.

Maximum hours and exemptions

The normal daily ceiling is 12 working hours. Exceptions cover an accident or its threat, work essential to community life or national defence/security, urgent machinery or plant work, and unforeseeable interruption. An overtime-exemption application is needed to work above 12 hours, up to 14, or above 72 overtime hours a month. Specified prohibited activities cannot receive an exemption. Rest-day or holiday work is excluded from the 72-hour count until it exceeds normal daily hours; those extra hours count. Add rest-day or holiday pay to the usual hourly basic rate × 1.5 × overtime hours.

Rest-day scheduling and pay

Provide one unpaid rest day a week: ordinarily midnight to midnight, or a continuous 30 hours for shift workers. A 30-hour period starting before 6pm on Sunday counts for that week even if it ends on Monday. A non-Sunday rest-day roster must be communicated before each month begins. Other non-working days are not automatically rest days; the gap between rest days may not exceed 12 days. Compulsory rest-day work is permitted only in exceptional circumstances.

Find the applicable leave rule

Annual leave depends on Employment Act coverage, completed service and the relevant service year. The detailed guides cover entitlement, pro-rating, unused leave, unpaid leave and different work patterns.

Find the applicable leave rule

Start with eligibility and pro-rated entitlement, then check medical reimbursement and salary rules. The separate special-situations page addresses how particular circumstances affect the right to paid sick leave.

Eleven paid holidays

Employees covered by the Employment Act receive 11 paid gazetted public holidays: New Year, both Chinese New Year days, Hari Raya Puasa, Hari Raya Haji, Good Friday, Labour Day, Vesak Day, National Day, Deepavali and Christmas. When a holiday coincides with the rest day, the next working day becomes the paid holiday.

Eligibility for holiday pay

Holiday pay uses the gross rate. Unauthorised absence without reasonable excuse on the working day immediately before or after the holiday can remove entitlement. Authorised adjacent leave does not. A holiday falling within approved unpaid leave is unpaid: unpaid leave on 8 August alone leaves 9 August payable, but unpaid leave from 8–10 August makes 9 August unpaid.

Working-day, non-working-day and rest-day scenarios

For a five-day week, Saturday is normally the non-working day and Sunday the rest day. Apply the correct rule rather than treating both as the same. Contractual terms govern employees outside the Employment Act.

Substitution and time off

Employer and employee may agree to substitute another working day for the public holiday. Time off in hours instead of holiday-work pay is available only to employees outside Part 4 and normally by agreement. Without agreement on duration, the employer may pay an extra day basic salary, allow four hours off where holiday work was four hours or less, or a full day off where work exceeded four hours. Unexplained absence adjacent to the holiday permits deduction of one gross-paid day from monthly gross salary.

CPF topics

MOM’s CPF directory covers the account system, retirement withdrawal and payout ages, the Basic Retirement Sum, uses for housing and healthcare, contribution eligibility and employer payment duties. The CPF Advisory Panel material concerns recommendations made in 2015 and is presented with that historical context.

Employee coverage

The official calculator covers qualifying Employment Act employees: non-workmen at most S$2,600 monthly basic pay and workmen at most S$4,500. A normal rest day is a whole midnight-to-midnight day and is not itself paid.

Check who requested the work

The amount depends on whether the employer or employee requested the work, whether hours exceed half the normal day, and whether they exceed the normal day. The detailed hours/rest-day guide contains the full comparison table. Use the official calculator for the relevant salary and hours rather than treating every rest-day task as ordinary overtime.

Monthly-rated part-time formulas

The denominator must use the part-time employee’s own weekly hours or workdays, rather than a full-time 44-hour default. These are basic pay calculations.

Eligibility and hourly entitlement

Employment Act-covered part-time employees receive paid annual, sick and hospitalisation leave; eligible parents can receive the applicable maternity, paternity or childcare benefits. Pay reflects their working hours. Annual and paid sick/hospitalisation leave require three service months. Entitlement is in hours, so conversion to days is unnecessary.

Annual leave formula and example

Leave hours = part-time annual work hours ÷ comparable full-time annual work hours × the full-timer’s leave days for equal service × full-time hours/day. For 20 hours/week against 44, seven annual days and eight hours/day, the official example yields (20×52)/(44×52)×7×8 = 25.5 hours. A four-hour day off deducts four hours.

Annual-leave encashment

The contract can expressly agree to add earned annual leave to hourly gross pay. This is not allowed for employees working at least five days/week and 30–34 weekly hours inclusive. Added hourly amount = annual leave hours ÷ (weekly part-time hours ×52) × hourly gross pay. At S$5, 25.5/(20×52)×5 = S$0.12, giving S$5.12 gross hourly.

Sick and hospitalisation examples

Use the same hours ratio with the comparable full-timer’s applicable leave days. Paid sick or hospitalisation leave cannot be encashed. At 20 versus 44 weekly hours, full-time 14 sick days and eight hours/day give 50.9 sick-leave hours; 60 hospitalisation days give 218.2 hours, including those 50.9 sick-leave hours. Taking sick leave on a four-hour workday deducts four hours.

Two payment bands

Hours above the part-timer’s daily contractual hours but within comparable full-time normal hours are paid at the hourly basic rate. Hours above the full-timer’s normal day attract 1.5 times the basic hourly rate.

Nine-hour example

With a four-hour part-time day, an eight-hour full-time comparator and S$5 basic hourly pay, working nine hours produces overtime payment (4×5)+(1×5×1.5)=S$27.50, in addition to the normal four-hour pay.

Pro-rated holiday hours

Paid public-holiday entitlement follows part-time annual hours ÷ comparable full-time annual hours × full-time public-holiday days × full-time hours/day. At 22 versus 44 weekly hours, 11 holidays and eight full-time hours/day, annual entitlement is 44 paid hours, or four hours for each holiday.

Contractual encashment

The contract may explicitly agree to add holiday entitlement to hourly gross pay instead of paying on holidays. Added hourly amount = holiday-entitlement hours ÷ (part-time weekly hours×52) × hourly gross pay. With 44 holiday hours, 22 weekly hours and S$5 gross hourly, the addition is S$0.19 and combined hourly gross pay S$5.19.

Eligibility and roster

Part 4-covered part-time employees required to work at least five days/week get one rest day/week. The employer determines the day; a non-Sunday schedule must be communicated before the month starts. Payment distinguishes employer-requested from employee-requested work.

Employer-requested nine-hour example

A four-hour part-time day, eight-hour full-time day and S$5 basic hourly rate produce (4×5)×2 + (4×5) + (1×5×1.5) = S$67.50 for nine hours worked on a rest day at the employer’s request.

CPF: payment categories and thresholds

For citizen/PR employees earning more than S$50 monthly, CPF can apply even during probation and part-time or contract work. At more than S$50 up to S$500, only the employer share is payable under the stated rule; above S$500 the employee share may be recovered from wages. Contributions are due at month end; late-payment enforcement may follow if not paid by the 14th of the next month. The actual percentage depends on the applicable employee category.

Overtime and part-time worked examples

A S$1,200 monthly basic salary gives an unrounded hourly basic rate of 12 × 1,200 ÷ (52 × 44) = S$6.293706… and a 1.5-times overtime rate of S$9.440559…, or S$9.44 when rounded only at the final cent. The guide’s rounded illustration should not replace precise payroll calculation. For a comparable 44-hour full-time week and eight-hour day, a 22-hour part-timer’s annual entitlement for 11 public holidays is 22 ÷ 44 × 11 × 8 = 44 paid hours, or four hours per holiday.

Keeping evidence and asking for help

Keep contracts, attendance records, pay slips and bank-payment evidence together. Match the salary period and overtime period before checking a shortfall. A signed voucher should reflect money actually received; do not sign a blank voucher. Use the MOM or TADM route appropriate to the issue.

Related topics

• Uplifting our lower-wage workers
• Workright: know your employment rights