Singapore Immigration Policy Updates
As a part of an initiative to facilitate an encouraging environment to both citizens and foreign expatriates, the government of Singapore keeps on updating the immigration policy at an interval. This page keeps track of recent updates pertaining to various immigration and visa policies.
This page provides you with the information on recent revisions to Singapore immigration policies. Below are the latest updates that the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) has announced recently in the year 2013.
Revision to the EntrePass Scheme
The Ministry of Manpower (MOM) has announced some major revisions to the eligibility criteria for the EntrePass scheme of Singapore immigration policy. The new rules have been applied from 1 September 2013. Following are the additional criteria that have been supplemented with the previous requirement for Singapore EntrePass.
To be eligible for EntrePass, the applicant must be either
- Gather funding from a recognized third-party venture capitalist or business angel
- Hold a licensed Intellectual property recognized by national IP institutions
- Supported by a Singapore government agency
- Have research collaboration with a research institution recognized by A*STAR (Agency for Science, Technology and Research) or any tertiary institutions
- Is an incubate at a recognized incubator supported by SPRING Singapore or NFR (National Research Foundation)
Revision to the Employment Pass Scheme
On September 2013, the Ministry of Manpower has announced the implementation of the new Fair consideration Framework (FCF) and the rise in minimum salary threshold for new Employment Pass applications. Following are the new rules which have come into force from January 2014.
- The qualifying monthly salary for EP application has been raised from S$ 3,000 to S$ 3,300. Nevertheless, the existing EP holders whose passes expire between January 1, 2014 and June 30, 2014, can apply for a one-year renewal of their passes based on the previous salary criteria. From July 1, 2014, all existing EP holders must abide by the new revised criteria.
- It is mandatory for all companies filing new EP applications to advertise the job vacancy on a new jobs bank administered by the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA). The advertisement must be open to Singaporeans. However, small sized companies having less than 25 employees in certain conditions are exempted from this rule.
Singapore government will impose stringent scrutiny and longer review period for the EP applications of the firms that failed to comply with the new rules. In such situation, EP privileges of those firms may even be cancelled.
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