Previously, we have covered leave entitlements such as medical leave and hospitalisation leave. A speech was also made by Member of Parliament Louis Ng on supporting the increment of official annual leave (AL) to 14 days as Singapore has a low number of legislative minimum AL and fewer public holidays.

Employees who are covered under the employment act and are working under a contract of service should be entitled to the various leave entitlements that we are sharing in this article if they meet the qualifying criteria. Such contracts include full-time, part-time, temporary, and contract workers for both locals and foreigners.

 

1. Annual Leave

An employee is entitled to paid annual leave after working with a company for 3 months. The Minimum entitlement is 7 days for the first year of work and the minimum increases by 1 day per year of working to maximum 14 days at 8th year of working with the company.

Year of service	Days of leave
1st	7
2nd	8
3rd	9
4th	10
5th	11
6th	12
7th	13
8th and thereafter	14

 

The days of leave the employee can take on the first year are prorated based on the number of completed months after their probation is over. The table below is an example for a first-year employee with 7 days of agreed annual leave. Annual leave left unused by the end of the year must be carried forward to the next year or encashed.

 

Months of service	Days of leave
1st to 3rd	0
4th & 5th	2
6th	3
7th and 8th	4
9th and 10th	5
11th and 12th	6

 

 

2. Non-working day

Usually, Saturdays are considered non-working days but it can change depending on the needs of the company and the nature of work. If the employee is required to work on a non-working day, they are owed 1 extra day’s salary in lieu.

 

3. Rest day

1 Rest day must be provided by the company for the employee and is usually provided on Sundays but can change based on the need of the company. If the nature of work (such as shift work) prevents a fixed schedule, a Rest day is considered as a “continuous period of 30-hours” without work. There must be 1 Rest day given per week, and each Rest day should not be more than 12 days apart. Employees can still work on rest days if the agreement is made between employer and employee, and if the employee works at the request of the employer, they need to be paid double for their work on a rest day.

 

4. Public holiday

There are 11 public holidays recognised in Singapore and they are 

1. New Year’s Day

2. Chinese New Year – first day

3. Chinese New Year – the second day

4. Hari Raya Puasa

5. Hari Raya Haji

6. Good Friday

7. Labour Day

8. Vesak Day

9. National Day

10. Deepavali

11. Christmas Day

If the public holiday falls on a non-working day, employees are owed one extra day of pay. If the public holiday falls on a Rest day, an off day in lieu needs to be provided.

 

5. Maternity leave

The eligibility criteria for 16 weeks of maternity leave requires meeting all of the following  criteria:

(i) Child is a Singaporean Citizen

(ii) You are legally married to the child’s father

(iii) You have been working for 3 or more months with the company

If either 1 or  2 are not met, the duration of maternity leave decreases to 12 weeks. Maternity leave can be taken from 4 weeks before the expected delivery date. Maternity leave also entitles mothers to their full salary during the leave period.

 

6. Paternity leave

Employees need to meet the same criteria as maternity leave above. However, the duration is 2 weeks. Paternity leave entitles fathers to a maximum of $2,500 of their salary including CPF contribution.

 

7. Shared parental leave

Fathers can apply to use up to 4 weeks of their partner’s maternity leave to extend their paternity leave.

 

8. Adoption leave

Adoption leave is only applicable if the child being adopted is less than 12 months old. This leave is only applicable to mothers. The child should also be Singaporean or will become a Singaporean in 6 months. Mothers are given a  maximum of  12 weeks of adoption leave while salary entitlement is up to $10,000 per 4 weeks ($30,000 in total if it’s 3rd or more adoption; first and second adoption is entitled up to $20,000).

 

9. Childcare leave

Parents can take up to 6 days of Child care leave regardless of the number of children they have (2 days max if the child is not Singaporean). The criteria for taking childcare leave is as follows:

(i) Applicable only if the youngest child is younger than 7 years old.

(ii) Eligible only when the employee has been working with the company for 3 months or more (Days will be prorated if it is the first year the employee is working with the company).

(iii) Extended childcare leave entails the employee of 2 days of child care leave for children between the age of 7 and 12

 

Are you aware of all the different types of leave you may be eligible for? Have you faced difficulty in taking any of the above leave previously?