S Pass quota and levy requirements

Quota requirement

A dependency ratio ceiling (DRC), or quota, is the maximum ratio of foreign workers to the total workforce that a company in a given sector can employ.

Under the existing quota, the number of S Pass holders your company can hire is capped at:

• 10% of the company’s total workforce in the services sector.
• 15% in the construction, manufacturing, marine shipyard and process sectors.

We use information from your company’s CPF account to compute the number of local employees hired by your company, which determines the foreign worker quota.

The foreign worker quota is calculated based on the average number of local employees in your company over the last 3 months.  To ensure your quota is calculated correctly, please declare the paid salaries and CPF contributions of your local employees promptly and accurately.

A Singaporean or Permanent Resident employee employed under a contract of service, including the company’s director, is counted as: 

• 1 local employee if they earn the LQS of at least $1,600 per month.
• 0.5 local employee if they earn half the LQS of at least $800 to below $1,600 per month.

The number of local employees will be updated every Saturday and you can check the quota balance on the next working day. 

Any late or non-payment of CPF contributions and salaries declaration will affect your quota and may cause your foreign workers to be allocated higher levy tiers.

• Refer to the Guidelines on the Calculation of Quota and Levy Bill to find out more on how your quota and levy bill are calculated.  
• Log on to WP Online to check your company’s current workforce and quota
• Use the quota calculator below to  plan how many Work Permit and S Pass holders your company can hire.

Calculate your quota

If you have never applied for a Work Permit or S Pass, you need to declare your business activity. Based on your declaration, we will assign your company to the most relevant sector, which determines the number of Work Permit and S Pass holders you can hire.

Levy requirement

The foreign worker levy, commonly known as “levy”, is a pricing mechanism to regulate the number of foreign workers in Singapore.

As an employer, you must pay the levy for all your S Pass holders. The levy liability starts from the day the S Pass is issued and ends when the pass is cancelled or expires.

You should pay the levy using GIRO. 

Levy rate

For the services sector, the levy rate is as follows:

For all sectors (excluding services), the levy rate is as follows:

Levy rates are regularly reviewed and adjusted as required. See the upcoming changes in S Pass levy rates and quota.

Note: The daily levy rate applies only to S Pass holders who did not work for a full calendar month. The daily levy rate is calculated as follows: (Monthly levy rate x 12) / 365 = rounding up to the nearest cent.