Out-Law / Your Daily Need-To-Know

Employers in Singapore to receive S$2.2bn under job support plan

25 Jun 2021, 3:08 am

Over 140,000 employers in Singapore will receive a share of S$2.2 billion ($1.6bn) under the Jobs Support Scheme (JSS) starting from 30 June.

The payouts will support the wages of over two million employees. “With this payout, more than $26.7bn ($19.8bn) of JSS support would have been disbursed since the introduction of the scheme at the Unity Budget in February 2020”, said a joint statement of the Ministry of Finance (MOF) and Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS).

Qualified employers should have made mandatory Central Provident Fund (CPF) contributions for their local employees for the months of January to March by the stipulated deadlines.

For the payment in June, employers in the aviation, aerospace, and tourism sectors will receive 50% support for the first $4,600 ($3414) of gross monthly wages paid in the first three months this year.

Employers in food services, retail, arts and entertainment, land transport, built environment, and marine and offshore will receive 30% support for wages paid during the same period while employers in all other sectors will get 10% support.

Employer will not get support if they are in sectors including biomedical sciences, precision engineering, electronics, financial services, information and communications technology, media, postal and courier, online retail, and supermarkets and convenience stores.

Mayumi Soh of Pinsent Masons MPillay, the Singapore joint law venture between MPillay and Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind Out-Law, said: “This payout is intended to help companies retain jobs by partially covering the salary of Singapore citizen and permanent resident employees, and therefore helping locals through this crisis.”

Singapore’s government had previously announced that the JSS will be extended to industries severely affected by the Covid-19 from 16 May to 11 July and those sectors will get 50% support in this period. Other affected sectors will get 30% support during the same period. After that, these sectors will continue to receive 10% support from 12 July to 25 July. The enhanced payout will be paid in September.

The JSS provides wage support for helping companies on retaining their local workers during their suffering from business loss due to Covid-19 pandemic.