Table of Contents

~~~~~~~~~~ Super Outdated, for my reference only ~~~~~~~~

Basic IRAS - Tax Information

How Tax Works in SG

  1. First, you will/or if you will receive notification to file income tax return;
    • Tax Return definition: tax report forms that contains information that Gov needs to calculate your tax
    • if you are under “Auto-inclusion scheme (AIS)“ (which means, your boss will file tax return for you) AND you did receive a message from Gov about you are “under Non-filing Service”, then you can skip the first step.
  2. Second, Update and Submit you tax reliefs and rebate information on http://mytax.iras.gov.sg (Before Deadline Date: for 2016 case, it is April 18 for online filing, April 15 for paper filing)
    • Very Important, as the Tax information are Provided by both Your Boss and Yourself, since no one knows you have some personal family reliefs but Yourself
    • Here are the steps:
      1. Login in myTax Portal with SingPass
      2. under e-Service For individual Income Tax on left panel > “e-File Form B/B1”
      3. click in and read through the ready-filled information
      4. refer to relief as I wrote about below to fill in the other reliefs
      5. Most Important: Child Relief and Parenthood Tax Rebate if You Got New Born Child (Detail explained below)
        1. Enter your new child information, detail refer to the website link below I wrote
        2. Click on Parenthood Tax Rebate at below of the page above the submit button, it will bring you to a new page to enter child information needed, once finish, click the button below to confirm and back to main form page
      6. After relief information done, then confirm and submit the tax form using buttons at bottom of the page.
      7. Done
  3. Third, later, you will receive “Notice of Assessment (NOA)” (basically the “Tax Bill”)

Tax Structure

sample look of notice of tax assessment

structure of tax

(ref: https://www.iras.gov.sg/irashome/Individuals/Locals/Paying-your-taxes-Claiming-refunds/How-to-Read-Your-Tax-Bill/) (ref: https://www.iras.gov.sg/irashome/Individuals/Locals/Working-Out-Your-Taxes/What-is-Taxable--What-is-Not/)

Progress amount rate actual tax amount year income monthly total tax
20k 0% 0 20k 1666 0
+10k 2% 200 SGD 30k 2.5k 200
+10k 3.5% 350 SGD 40k 3.3K 550
7% 50k 4.1k 550+700=1250
7% 60k 5k 550+1400 = 1950
7% 70k 5.8k 550+2100 = 2650
+40k 7% 2800 SGD 80k 6.6k 3.3K
11.5% 90k 7.5k 3350+1150 = 4500
11.5% 100k 8.3k 4500+1150 = 5650
11.5% 110k 9.1k 5650+1150 = 6800
+40k 11.5% 4600 SGD 120k 10k 8k
+40k 15% 6000 SGD 160k 13k 14k
+40k 17% 6800 SGD 200k 16k 20K
+120k 18% 21.6K SGD 320k 26k 42k
extra 20%

(ref: https://www.iras.gov.sg/irashome/Individuals/Locals/Working-Out-Your-Taxes/Income-Tax-Rates/)

Python code for calculation 

tdata = [(20000, 0),(10000, 0.02),(10000,0.035),(40000,0.07),(40000,0.115),(40000,0.15),(40000,0.18),(40000,0.19),(40000,0.195),(40000,0.20),(320000,22)]
total = 7000*12
rest=total
t=0
 
for i,data in enumerate(tdata):
    print(rest)
    if rest<data[0]:
        t+=rest*data[1]
        print(rest*data[1])
        rest=0
        break
    else:
        t+=data[0]*data[1]
        print(data[0]*data[1])
        rest = rest - data[0]
print(t)

Element: approved expense

Element: approved donation and investment

Element: reliefs and rebates

Common Reliefs

  1. Course Fee relief
    • requires course with “a recognised academic and professional qualification” or “SG registered entity with ACRA”
    • or relevant to your current work or new work
    • Will Not Eligible for general or basic skill or hobby or language or non-previous-work-experience
    • max to 5.5K per year, useful for course fee, test fee, registration fee, tuition fee.
  2. CPF cash top-up relief (Automatically Claimed)
    • cash top-up to your CPF Special account;
      • relief = minimum(top-up, 7000 SGD)
      • Condition: SA sum ⇐161k
    • cash top up to your Parent/Grandparent/Sibling/Spouse's CPF Special account
      • Condition: Target's annual income Must < 4k, that is monthly 333 SGD
      • relief = minimum(top-up, 7000 SGD)
      • Condition: SA sum ⇐161k
  3. CPF relief (Automatically Claimed if you under Auto Inclusion Scheme)
    • basically means your CPF part out from income will not be taxed
    • IF employee, THEN condition: your employee CPF monthly contribution MUST < 5K, 6k; False: Can't claim
    • IF self-employed, roughly same idea, also apply to addition medisave contribution
  4. Earned Income Relief (Automatically Claimed)
    • amount is 1000 SGD for the year, basically means you got some spare cash that Gov don't want to tax you that hard.
  5. Life Insurance Relief
    • basically, you payment bill cost on insurance will not be taxed.
    • Condition: yearly CPF contribution MUST < 5k, means, your yearly income roughly < 5k / 20% = 25k, that is 2k per month.
  6. NSMan relief (automatically claimed)
    • 3000 SGD for the year for man, 750 SGD for wife, 750 SGD for each parent
  7. Parent relief
    • 7000 SGD per parent for the year if stay together (detail refer to link)
    • Condition: parent > 55 or ill

Additional Reliefs

  1. Child Relief (Once fill once, Gov will remember)
  2. Spouse Relief
    • 2000 SGD for spouse, Condition: spouse yearly income < 4k, that 333 SGD per month
  3. (female only) maid relief
  4. (female only) grandparent relief
  5. (female only) Working mother child relief

Additional Rebate
(Rebate is like one-time credit, it can be used to actually pay the final tax bill, unlike relief, as relief can repeatably help you reduce each year's tax calculation.)

  1. Parenthood Tax rebate

Detail: Child Relief

Detail: Parenthood Tax Rebate

Oversea income

If your employer is in the Auto-Inclusion Scheme

What is Auto-Inclusion Scheme

Questions on Estate tax

Questions and Answers

1. How to Distribute "Parenthood Tax Rebate" and "Child Relief" between Husband and Wife

Answer