Singapore Expats

I was offered the position of IT helpdesk in Singapore to support other regions cause of my other language fluency, with 12-hour shift and every 2 days off after 2 days of work for 12 hours. The basic salary is S$3,800/month and was wondering whether it's quite common here and whether there are other benefits that are commonly offered by local companies here.
Also whether the 12-hour shift is ok, according to the labour law here...?
Thanks in advance.

Crabathor,
I have never lived or worked in Singapore but I from what I know that is nothing unusual and doesn't seem to be a bad deal wages wise.

Plavt.

Nothing unusual and the pay is good. (take into account the tax rate, which you can get int he single digits)

Lots of people work 12 hour shifts, some maids even work 24 hour shifts. Not many people get so many days off, sounds OK to me.

Still was wondering about what kind of benefits that are offered usually in companies in Singapore, both local and multinationals?
For example from what I heard that in Japan, it's quite common to expect to have health insurance, housing subsidy, unemployment insurance etc.; but not sure about here yet.
Thanks in advance.

There is no rule, and each case is different. The trend is that new contracts have less and less benefits included. Anyway it's also depending on the negotiation, as usual...

crabathor wrote:...
Also whether the 12-hour shift is ok, according to the labour law here...?
Thanks in advance.

There are labour rules that are strictly followed but that's not based upon daily working hours. It's about a weekly calculation, how many hours can you work?

Like most of the people working in shifts have following two shifts like 1st morning and 2nd night then 3rd is off day where 4th is called as rest day. so the entire cycle for a week comes within the stipulated weekly hours from the ministry.

Will fine tune Scorpions reply just a little. The shift work is usually based on 40/44 hours per week but is averaged across 'two' weeks so that is usually results in 80/88 hours in a two week period. Otherwise, I agree, the offer doesn't sound too bad.

sms

Thank you everybody for the tips, definitely much appreciated.

Carpe Diem wrote:There is no rule, and each case is different. The trend is that new contracts have less and less benefits included. Anyway it's also depending on the negotiation, as usual...

I must admit since I wasn't on expat package from the beginning and still have 3 years of working experience only, I suppose I don't really have a strong position in the negotiation... I can say though that I have a working experience also in a quite specialised field that is still considered a new technology, plus do have another language fluency.

But pray tell, as one friend was negotiating his salary based on that he has mortgage obligation back home. He used to be on an expat package and just recently got his PR and he was negotiating his next job's salary with another company, which is not local though. However, I would say the HR manager can just say the obligation is not the company's business thus doesn't make it a strong case for the negotiation I guess?

I am going to negotiate the shift timing also as I would like to be a mirror/partner of another staff who prefers and was granted already it seems a semi-fixed shift in the morning as she is attending a night course.
As I want to attend a morning course, I was asking to be put to partner with her to cover the night shift rather. But the helpdesk team leader seems not to like the idea to give a favourable treatment to what is considered too many staff already if she granted another one to me...
This staff and I also have given our words that we would put a higher priority on work and so when it is necessary for us to change our shifts, we promise to comply and I'm quite sure lecturers of adult and part-time students would be able to understand...

My argument for the shift is that the acquired skill from the postgrad course I'm going to attend can be used to benefit the company as well as I don't intend to hop from one job to another job especially not in the short-run.
And for the salary, my argument is to have an increase a little from my current salary cause of my language fluency and working experience and I also mentioned about the coming obligation with my study even though I realise the last part is rather a weak argument, is it?

If you were in my position, is there anything else you can add there?
I suppose cause of my not-so-long working experience yet, I still need to acquire the negotiation skill yet, so would appreciate any advice you can give.
Thanks.

Crabathor, as already mentioned the salary that you were mentioning was an average for a person working in singapore for the first time.

Considering your working experience of about less than 3years behind, you can take it as an step for entering into the singapore job market. The list of negotitation you can make with the company other than the salary are no of annual leave/per year, house accomodation allowance and over time pay like should be getting double the pay when working on the rest day and triple the pay on your off day.

hopes this helps, cheers

hi,

now i am in singapore.and working in multinational company.i would like to contact to you.

please mail me your contact address & phone no


Email: [email protected]

crabathor wrote: I am going to negotiate the shift timing also as I would like to be a mirror/partner of another staff who prefers and was granted already it seems a semi-fixed shift in the morning as she is attending a night course.
As I want to attend a morning course, I was asking to be put to partner with her to cover the night shift rather. But the helpdesk team leader seems not to like the idea to give a favourable treatment to what is considered too many staff already if she granted another one to me...
This staff and I also have given our words that we would put a higher priority on work and so when it is necessary for us to change our shifts, we promise to comply and I'm quite sure lecturers of adult and part-time students would be able to understand...

I don't think you can negtiate your shift hour as majority of IT helpdesk are supporting 24X7
That's another reason why you get such good pay there