Singapore Expats

Hello, I would like to freelance for an overseas client. I am self employed, I haven't registered a business here in Singapore as my client is overseas and MOM does not requires me to do so if I don't do business with Singaporean clients. My client needs me to mention a number on the invoices and I understood it had to be my tax identification number. My question is: should I use my FIN number, which is my tax ID in singapore, for invoice purposes? Is that the way to do it? Thank you.

No. Don't do that as EP holders cannot run businesses

Use your passport number or home country IC.

Thanks but I'm not an EP holder, I 'm on a DP. Isn' t tax ID the number to mention for invoicing clients abroad?

PNGMK wrote: ↑

Wed, 12 Feb 2025 7:31 am

No. Don't do that as EP holders cannot run businesses

Use your passport number or home country IC.

The OP is not running a business under Singapore regulations.
The OP is not registered as a Singapore business.
The OP doesn't have Singapore clients, and therefore takes no jobs from Singaporeans, and therefore does not need to be registered as a business nor need a work permit of some sort.

The OP would file a Singapore tax return just like a karang guni... as an unregistered sole proprietorship. As long as transactions are being conducted in the OP's name only, ie, checks made payable to "Chris P Bacon" and can be deposited in the OP's personal bank account, then no problem at all. More problems if the checks arrive as "Chris P Bacon Accounting Services" that would require a registered business name in order to get a bank account styled that way. Singapore banks will NOT deposit a business name check into a personal account.

OP, you haven't stated in which country your overseas client is located. In most cases your income that you earn from overseas clients is taxable in Singapore and not in the country in which your client resides (or your home country) but you need to check the tax treaties for particulars.

I don't know why your client wants a number... Singapore wouldn't know what to do if it received a 1099 from the USA with your FIN on it, for example. So, I'm with PNGMK on this one... use your passport number... it's an accurate ID of who you are.

The reality is that Singapore really has no way of knowing what you are earning and must rely upon your honesty in reporting income. The only reason why you might need your home country or client country's tax ID is because your income would be taxable in another country under a tax treaty.

Thanks for your reply.
I agree, I'm aware I don't need work permit as I only have overseas clients.
I suspect my client (from France) to require a number because they need a proof VAT cannot be applied as I'm not registered in France.
I don't understood why I should be taxable in Singapore though as foreign sourced revenues are not taxable. Is that because there is a tax convention between both countries?

singasonga wrote: ↑

Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:34 pm

I don't understood why I should be taxable in Singapore though as foreign sourced revenues are not taxable. Is that because there is a tax convention between both countries?

You, like many others, misunderstand this statement. What it means is this. Let's say that you're working for Dell in Singapore. You live in Singapore, you are tax resident in Singapore. Dell sends you to their Kuala Lumpur offices for a year. Malaysian tax regulations require that you be taxed in Malaysia. This is "foreign sourced revenues" and you are not taxed on them even though you remain tax resident in Singapore because you are paying Malaysian income tax. Nice try but you can't escape paying income tax somewhere... at least not legally.

Generally, if you are liable for both foreign tax and Singapore tax, the tax treaty usually specifies how you get tax relief from one country or the other. Singapore generally forgives tax due up to the amount you owe or the amount you paid in foreign tax, whichever is smaller.

It's virtually a global standard: You are tax resident for income tax purposes in the country in which you keep your primary residence. You live in Singapore. You are taxed in Singapore. It doesn't matter if your client is in Thailand or on the moon. It doesn't matter if you get paid into a Singapore bank or a bank in the Cayman Islands. It doesn't matter if you get paid in Singapore dollars or Indian Rupees. You remain tax resident in Singapore.

I ran a business in Singapore for 8 years. I had subsidiaries in Thailand, Hong Kong, and Malaysia, as well as a taxing entity in Australia. My payrolls and work permits for employees were sometimes complicated.

Many thanks, that's way clearer to me!

More than you ever wanted to know about foreign sourced income.

https://www.iras.gov.sg/media/docs/defa ... 9005b5.pdf

Just make sure your client is okay with it, and if you're unsure, it might help to double-check with a tax professional.

kenny666 wrote: ↑

Fri, 21 Mar 2025 4:38 am

Just make sure your client is okay with it, and if you're unsure, it might help to double-check with a tax professional.

The platitudes of the pedestrian mind. How utterly...underwhelming. "Just make sure your client is okay with it lah"? Ah, the profundity! The sheer weight of such counsel is crushing, a veritable avalanche of banality.

And, pray tell, what manner of existential reassurance is to be gleaned from "double-checking with a tax professional"? Shall we seek solace in the sterile certainties of bureaucratic expertise? Shall we entrust our very souls to the whims of the IRAS?

No, dear friend, such advice is naught but a palliative, a fleeting anesthetic for the existential dread that gnaws at our very being. It is a distraction, a trivial pursuit, a whistling-past-the-graveyard of the human condition.

Give me instead the anguish of uncertainty, the terror of the unknown, the crushing weight of responsibility. For it is in these depths that we find the truest expression of our humanity.