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Calculation of Foreign Worker Quotas

Declaration of business activity

If you have never applied for a Work Permit (WP) or S Pass before, you are required to declare your organisation’s business activity*, before submitting any WP or S Pass applications. We will assess and assign your organisation to the most relevant industry, based on the business activity declared. The industry assigned then determines the number of WP and S Pass holders the organisation may recruit.

* If your organisation has registered with Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority for less than six months and does not have a Central Provident Fund (CPF) account, please approach CPF Board to open an account. Your
organisation should contribute CPF for your local employees for at least one
month at the point of business activity declaration.


Declaration of Business Activity


Your may access this online service from 8am - 10pm (Monday to Saturday), excluding public holidays. (SingPass is required)

We aim to process your request within two working days.

You may also declare your business activity by submitting the hardcopy application form to MOM’s Work Pass Division. Forms processed manually will take seven working days.


Second CPF Account

You may have already employed Foreign Workers for a business activity under an existing CPF account. If you wish to have a second CPF account to employ Work Permits and/or S Pass holders for another business activity, please write to the Work Pass Division with details on your organisation's existing and new business activities. We aim to reply you within 14 working days.

Please refer to the table to see if you are required to enclose any other supporting documents.

Computation of quota

  1. A company/firm's Central Provident Fund (CPF) account is used by the Controller of Work Passes to determine its local workforce and foreign worker (FW) entitlement. The company/firm should ensure that CPF contributions under this account are made only to persons actively employed by the company/firm.
  2. The FW entitlement (quota) is based on the size of the total workforce in the company/business. 'Total workforce' refers to the sum of the local workforce, S Pass holders and Work Permit holders that are subjected to the sectoral Dependency Ratio. 'Local workforce' refers to those full-time employees (Singapore citizens or permanent residents) who have worked for a full month, and are receiving prompt monthly salary/CPF contributions which are similar to the industry norm. Two part-time employees are considered as one local full-time employee.

    For example, a company that employs two full-time local employees and two part-time employees will have a total local workforce of three persons. Employees who receive CPF contributions from multiple employers will not be considered in the calculation of the workforce.
  3. A company/business' quota balance is calculated based on the size of its local workforce for the past three months (in the same CPF account). The past three months refer to the latest CPF contribution records, excluding the current and last month.

    For example, the quota for August 2011 is computed using the months of April, May and June 2011.

Guidelines on Computation of Company's Quota Balance Download
Quota Calculator for Work Permits and S Passes Check Online

Industry-specific conditions & requirements

Visit the following sections to see eligibility criteria for FWs in the different industries.


Last updated on 04 August 2011 02:54 PM