Singapore’s relatively tight labour market and skills gap in certain industries has presented opportunities for some employees to start a side hustle and even work two jobs.
There’s nothing in Singapore’s employment laws to stop someone (Singaporeans or Permanent Residents) from working two full-time jobs at the same time. In fact, during the pandemic in 2020, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) published an advisory reiterating that employees can take on a second job as long as there are no i) prohibitions in an employee’s contract and/or ii) conflicts of interest.
This advisory was given during the COVID-19 circuit breaker, encouraging employers to be supportive of employees who were affected by the downturn – potentially having fewer work hours and earning a lower wage. Employees were encouraged to clarify with both their employers if there would be a conflict of interest or scheduling conflict.
Read Also: 5 Things You Need To Know About Allowing Your Employees To Take A Second Job
It Is Not Legal For Certain Employees To Have More Than One Job
While local employees can freely take on multiple jobs, foreign employees on work passes, such as work permits, S Pass and Employment Pass (EP) can only work for their designated employer. In addition, MOM also stated that they cannot engage in any other activities to earn additional income in Singapore.
Before taking on a second job, employees must ensure that their employment contract does not prohibit them from working with another employer. Even if there is no such clause in their contract, employees should act in good faith and honestly.
As such, they should refrain from the “grey area” of working for businesses that are competing with one another, or even complementary to one another as they may cross-refer business with ulterior motives. Of course, employees should not cross-deploy resources such as their working hours or technology to complete work for another company.
Read Also: Can You Really Enforce The Non-Compete Clause in Singapore?
Paying CPF To Employees With Two (Or More) Jobs
Employers in Singapore are responsible for making both the employer’s CPF contribution and Employee’s CPF contribution. This is regardless of how many employers the worker has – and it can be more than two.
As we would also know, employers only have to contribute CPF for up to $7,400 of an employee’s monthly salary. This figure is set to rise to $8,000 by 2026 There’s also an annual CPF contribution limit of $37,740 to take additional wages into account.
From 2025, younger Platform Workers will also start seeing CPF deductions from their earnings with Platform Operators. Platform Workers who are also holding on to a job will also start receiving CPF contributions from more than one source (i.e. the Platform Operator and their employer).
Read Also: Complete Guide To Employer’s CPF Contributions In Singapore (2025)
What If An Employee Earns More Than $7,400 Across Multiple Employers?
While employees should only receive CPF contributions on the first $7,400 of their monthly salaries, this is on a “per employment” basis. This also applies to the $37,740 CPF annual limit. For employers, this means they do not need to be concerned with what an employee is earning elsewhere.
For example, if an employer is paying their employee $4,000 a month, and another company is paying the same employee another $4,000 a month, it does not matter that they receive a combined CPF contribution that is more than the CPF Monthly Salary Ceiling. Individual employers only need to be concerned with what they are paying their employees.
However, the employee can apply to limit their share of CPF contributions to the $7,400 salary mark. They can do so by informing the CPF Board. They will also have to consent to the CPF Board informing all their employers as the notification will go directly to employers when the application is approved. This may result in additional administrative work for employers. Even if approved, this does not affect the amount the employers have to contribute – it only limits how much the employee has to contribute – up to the CPF Monthly Salary Ceiling of $7,400 and CPF Annual Limit of $37,740.
Of course, employees know that doing this will mean that their employer will be notified that they are working more than one job.
Read Also: Part-Time Employment Regulations: 10 Things To Know When Hiring A Part-Timer
Some Repercussions Of Working In Two Or More Jobs
#1 May Be Suspicious When Multiple Employers Are Contributing CPF
When hiring someone who has multiple jobs, or more precisely, CPF contributions, there may be additional questions about how it affects government schemes.
For example, back during the COVID-19 pandemic, employers who hired new employees may have been eligible for salary support under the Jobs Growth Incentive (JGI) scheme. Even if the employee was already employed elsewhere, it did not matter. Employers were still eligible for the scheme in its entirety.
In fact, IRAS issued a statement in May 2021, stating that they had denied $32 million to 1,300 employers after reviewing 800 JSS and 1,100 JGI payouts. Cases of suspected abuse were referred to the police.
For employers that legitimately hire and pay their employees who are holding two jobs, they may be impacted with additional scrutiny as well.
#2 Employers May Not Like It (And May Impose Monitoring)
As an employer, you may not want your employees to work multiple jobs. Obviously, working for a direct competitor would be a red line. However, even if employees are not working for a competitor, their focus may not be solely on your business.
Coupled with rising working-from-home trends, employers may start to question whether their employees are spending sufficient time on their projects. Questions may also arise about whether an employee is spending the designated working hours doing other work.
This could turn out to be demoralising for all other employees if employers start using monitoring tools/methods to keep tabs on employees.
Read Also: Can A Singapore Employee (On Work-From-Home Or Work-From-Anywhere) Move To Malaysia?
#3 Potentially Impact Employers’ Foreign Worker Quota
When counting eligible local workers for your foreign worker quota, employees who receive CPF contributions from three or more employers will not be counted.
At the same time, MOM explicitly states that employers should not use this as a method to contribute salary (and CPF) for the same employee under multiple companies to gain more foreign worker quota.
Read Also: Foreign Worker Quota In Singapore: What Is It And How To Calculate It For Your Business
#4 Higher Personal Income Tax Contribution For Employees
As an individual, you will be required to file your Income Tax Return with the Inland Revenue Authority Of Singapore (IRAS) when your total income exceeds more than $22,000, or have self-employment income with a net profit of more than $6,000, or you’re a non-resident who derives income from Singapore.
With more income sources, your total income might be subject to a higher income tax rate, which can be up to 24% for residents. While this is a good problem to have, it’s also better to pre-empt the higher tax payable and work out the possible qualifying tax deductions.
#5 More Contributions To Self-Help Groups (SHGs)
For employees, contributions to Self-Help Groups (SHGs) are on a “per employment” basis as well. This means that when employers are making CPF contributions each month, they will also be contributing to SHGs on multiple occasions.
Nevertheless, this is a smaller issue as the contributions are not very high. Employees can contact their respective SHG to stop contributions if they wish.
This is far from an exhaustive list of repercussions, and there may be more applicable ones. If you do know of any that we have missed out on, you can let us know at [email protected]
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