More than 90,000 employers are eligible to receive S$600 million in payouts for Wage Credit Scheme (WCS) initiated by Singapore’s government.

According to the Ministry of Finance (MOF), the payouts will be given via giro to the bank accounts of companies that raised the salaries of some of their workers. The disbursements will be made by March 31, Business Insider Singapore reports.

Under the WCS, the Government is co-funding 20 percent of qualifying wage increases given to more than 600,000 Singaporean employees in 2017 and 2018. After that, the co-funding ratio will be decreased to 15 percent in 2019 and 10 per cent in 2020. The ministry said that small and medium enterprises (SMEs) will receive around 70 per cent of the total sum allocated.

To receive the payouts, employers do not need to apply anything to the ministry, because only those who are eligible will receive letters from the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) informing them of the amount received.

According to the IRAS website, eligible employers are those who give wage increases to their Singapore Citizen employees who:

• earn a gross monthly wage of S$4,000 and below;
• received CPF contributions from a single employer for at least three calendar months in the preceding year;
• have been on the employer’s payroll for at least three calendar months in the qualifying year
• have at least S$50 gross monthly wage increase;
• are not one of the business owners of the same entity

Other eligibility conditions can be found at the IRAS website.

Introduced in 2013, the WCS has been extended twice – first in 2015 and again in 2018. The latest extension of three years was done to support businesses embarking on transformation efforts, and to encourage companies to share productivity gains with workers, MOF said.

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