Companies can apply for grants and incentives to implement flexible work arrangements (FWAs) such as flexi-load, flexi-place and flexi-time.
What is it
The Work-Life Grant aims to incentivise companies to sustain the use of flexible work arrangements (FWAs) for all employees, to create work-life harmony at the workplace.
The Work-Life Grant comprises 2 components:
- FWA Incentive
Incentivise companies to sustain implementation of FWAs for their local employees.
- Job Sharing Incentive
Incentivise employers to implement job sharing for employees at PMET-level with gross monthly salary of at least $3,600, before job sharing arrangement.
You can tap on one or both components.
Types of FWAs
The grant will support FWAs such as flexi-load (e.g. part time work and job sharing arrangements), and flexi-time (e.g. compressed work week). Other FWAs can be considered on a case-by-case basis.
From 2 June 2020, telecommuting and staggered hour arrangements will not be supported.
Employees using the FWAs must be working on a regular basis, i.e. not ad-hoc or casual employees.
FWA Incentive
The FWA Incentive encourages you to support employees who adopt FWAs.
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Amount
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Up to $70,000 per company over 2 years.
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Computation (yearly)
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$2,000 per local employee per year, who is a regular user of FWAs.
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Requirements
The incentive should be used to nurture and further workplace cultures that support better work-life harmony. In particular, to put in place FWA measures (e.g. part time work, job sharing arrangements).
To receive subsequent tranches of payouts, your company needs to sustain the work-life practices at your workplace
Eligibility
To be eligible:
- Employee must be a Singapore citizen or Permanent Resident.
- Employee must be on a permanent contract or a minimum employment contract term of 12 months.
- Company cannot claim for casual or temporary employees.
- Company must adopt the Tripartite Standard on FWAs at point of claim.
- Company must commit to employees that they will agree to their requests for FWAs when it is reasonably practicable to do so.
Support during COVID-19
Application for Enhanced WLG (COVID-19) ended on 1 June 2020, in line with the end of the Circuit Breaker period.
Supported through the enhanced WLG, companies will be in good stead with ready systems in place to sustain work-from-home and staggered hours arrangements during and beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.
You can still apply for existing WLG for other types of FWAs other than telecommuting and staggered hours.
For SMEs, if you need more help to ensure business continuity, including digital solutions, training courses, and other government support to overcome the challenges posed by the COVID-19 situation, you can check out IMDA’s available resources.
No longer accept applications
Since the implementation of the Circuit Breaker on 7 April 2020, many companies have explored various forms of flexible work arrangements (FWAs) over the past four months to ensure business continuity and the safety of their workers. From April to August 2020, more than $180M under the Work-Life Grant (WLG) will support close to 8,000 companies that have applied, covering over 90,000 employees to adopt FWAs during this challenging period and beyond.
We are heartened that more companies are offering FWAs to protect the health of their employees and promote work-life harmony. As the provision of FWAs is increasingly normalised and made prevalent at workplaces, the need to incentivise the provision of FWAs through the WLG has reduced. As such, Programme Partners will no longer be accepting applications for the WLG after 6pm, 18 August 2020.
Companies that still require support to implement work-from-home arrangements may consider Enterprise Singapore’s Productivity Solutions Grant (PSG), which covers IT solutions, equipment and consultancy services to enhance business processes and improve productivity. Through the PSG, businesses will be able to implement business continuity measures, including online collaboration tools and virtual meeting tools to support remote working. These solutions are supported with funding up to 80% and are open for applications through Business Grants Portal until 31 December 2020. You can view the full list of supportable solutions under the PSG.
For companies that require support in their transformation journey or other business areas, the list of available government assistance schemes can be found on the
GoBusiness Gov Assist. If you need help with identifying the most relevant government assistances for your company, you can make an appointment with
business advisors at SME Centres or access the
e-Adviser.
TAFEP has made available and is continuing to provide resources to support companies in implementing FWAs.
We hope companies will remain in good stead with ready systems in place to sustain work-from-home and staggered hours arrangements during and beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.
Job Sharing Incentive
The Job Sharing Incentive encourages you to support PMET-level employees who adopt job sharing arrangements.
| Amount |
Up to $35,000 per company over 2 years. |
| Computation (yearly) |
$3,500 per local, full-time PMET employee per year, who is a regular user of job sharing. |
Requirements
- Companies are required to adopt the Tripartite Standard on FWAs at point of claim, as part of the Work-Life Grant to better attract and retain talent and improve the productivity of their workforce.
- Companies are eligible to receive the Job Sharing Incentive of $3,500 per local PMET employee (Singapore citizen or PR) who is a regular user, per year for two consecutive years, capped at $35,000 per company.
- Companies can only claim for full-time PMET employees on permanent or a minimum employment contract term of 12 months, in a job paying a gross monthly salary of at least $3,600, before the job sharing arrangement.
- Companies must have put in place a formal arrangement to redistribute workload amongst the employees and remunerate accordingly. The employees taking on the redistributed work can be existing employees or new hires with a minimum employment contract term of 12 months.
Programme Partners
SNEF, NTUC’s e2i and Singapore Manufacturing Federation (SMF) are the only official Programme Partners for Work-Life Grant.
Find out more
More information on Work-Life Grant: