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Generally speaking, Singapore has clear and robust laws addressing common employment abuses, such as non-payment or short-payment of salaries, excessive overtime or kickbacks. Yet, from TWC2’s casework, we see that most problems brought up by migrant workers stem from violations of law or regulations on the part of their employers.

So, if a worker describes a problem, e.g. unpaid salaries or kickbacks, it is more than a civil dispute between employee and employer; it is equally a criminal violation by the employer.

Moreover, most violations are not committed only against one worker; they usually take the form of a company-wide practice (e.g. under-payment of overtime work) that affects all workers. Thus, if one worker lodges a valid complaint, there is good reason to believe that similar abuses are inflicted on all other employees too, even if they are too afraid to speak up.

Logically, therefore, the most efficient way for any regulatory authority to check for breaches of law is to follow through from one complaint and conduct an inspection of the human resource or payroll practices of the company and which affect other employees. Such a targetted approach is more likely to uncover violations than any random check on random companies.

The cook

Manan came to Singapore in July 2024 to join a catering company. He was a cook and the company supplied mass-catered meals to Bangladeshi workers in various dormitories. The company had applied for an S-Pass for him. Never having worked in Singapore before, and with only a minimal grasp of English, Manan had no idea what an S-Pass meant. He had no clue that it was a pass category meant for workers with mid-level technical skills.

All he knew was that the In-Principle Approval for a Work Pass (“IPA”) that he had seen before coming to Singapore stated a monthly salary of $4,200. Indeed, that would be the kind of salary required by law for S-Pass employees, but Manan saw it as the going rate for “chefs” – the lofty term stated as his occupation in the IPA. He had no idea that cooks in catering companies producing standardised grub day in day out aren’t usually paid such salaries. How would he have known when he had never left Bangladesh?

Among unemployed young Bangladeshis looking for work, Singapore is widely seen as an El Dorado. People earn big money in Singapore. To Manan, there was nothing suspicious about a salary of $4,200 a month for a cook in a production line. He eagerly accepted the job.

For the first three months that he was at work (August, September and October 2024), he was surprised to receive only $1,500 in cash as salary, but he didn’t immediately speak up because he didn’t want to jeopardise the job he had waited so long to get.

Even when he got really fatigued from having to work 16 hours a day (occasionally 18), he didn’t speak up. His responsibilities spanned all three meals a day, seven days a week, preparing breakfast, lunch and dinner for dormitory residents.

In November, the employer opened a bank account for him. For November and December, $4,200 was deposited each month into his bank account as salary. However, “Boss son, he stand near me,” Manan reports. “He say, must go ATM and withdraw $2,700, and give back to him.”

Should Manan not do as told, “He make threat, say many problem make for me.”

And so, Manan returned $2,700 each month in cash, as instructed. This is a classic form of kickback; see this story in The Online Citizen, 3 August 2018, about “cash back”.

Manan felt increasingly frustrated that his promised salary of $4,200 a month was slipping away. What finally prompted him to act was when the employer demanded that he sign some blank pieces of paper. Under pressure, Manan signed, and then the thought occurred to him that the boss would write or print onto the blank space above his signature words which could be used to justify the return of $2,700 each month. For example – and it has happened to other workers before – the boss could create a fake loan agreement, and later justify the monthly $2,700 as repayment of the fictitious loan.

Manan then decided to make a police report to pre-empt any future misuse of those blank pieces of paper. One thing led to another: he was fired from his job and he then filed a salary claim at the Ministry of Manpower (MOM).

When Manan came to TWC2 to consult with us – together with a co-worker in a similar situation – we told them that we could glimpse a few more violations from hearing their account of events: (1) the excessive overtime hours he was required to put in; (2) the failure to pay him overtime pay; (3) the uncompensated hours on rest days and public holidays he was made to work.

We advised Manan that he should amend his salary claim to include these elements which, when included, would balloon his claim to well over $20,000. The employer owed him that much. We gave similar advice to the co-worker.

Less than a month later, we heard from Manan that he was back in Bangladesh. He had settled for just $4,000, not even 20% of what he was owed.

Why did you fold so easily? we ask him.

He didn’t have the confidence to fight on, he says, because the first three months’ salaries were paid in cash and the kickbacks were demanded in cash as well. There was no written trail to prove his claims. Furthermore, he thought it would be easier to find new jobs from Bangladesh than in Singapore where he knew nobody. Bangladesh has agents crawling all over, albeit rapacious ones.

We can understand his thinking.

The bigger picture

Yet, we should also keep in mind the bigger picture. The employer had underpaid him $2,700 a month for the first three months, and then clawed back $2,700 a month for the fourth and fifth months. In total, the employer stole 5 x $2,700 = $13,500 from Manan, just from basic pay alone. Add in unpaid overtime and rest day pay, and the figure may well be twice that or more.

One might be tempted to argue that the basic salary written in his In-Principle Approval was not the market rate for a production-line cook, but that is beside the point. Manan was promised $4,200; it was the contracted basic salary. In addition, the law makes it clear that working overtime and on rest days should be paid for on top of basic salary. It is not for an employer to arbitrarily decide not to pay.

However, the case seemed to have been closed with the employer giving Manan just $4,000. It’s the end of the matter only if we see this as a private, civil dispute and no more. But it is not. There is a public interest angle to ensuring that laws are honoured and breaches punished. Otherwise, other workers can be similarly victimised with impunity.

We know that Manan was not the only employee victimised this way. He came to TWC2 with a co-worker with a similar tale. There were plenty of other workers in the catering company, said Manan, though he didn’t know the details of their salary arrangements. However, a reasonable case can be made that the whole company should be investigated. Why would an employer, so successful at taking kickbacks and not paying proper salaries, limit his “tricks” to just one or two employees?

The way to tackle this kind of systemic abuse is for there to be an operating protocol within MOM in which, any time TADM (the salary claims unit) hears of such violations, TADM immediately relays the information to the enforcement branch which should promptly launch an investigation into the whole company.

Is there such a system in MOM? Did any of what Manan told his case officer get relayed to the enforcement branch? We have no indication of that. If that’s the case, not only has the employer been enriched, criminal activity has been overlooked.

Our December 2024 report Survey finds 5.6 percent still paid salaries in cash mentioned that cash payments to S-Pass holders may be a continuing issue, obscuring more serious abuses.

We only realised a month after this article was published that a Member of Parliament had in February 2025 asked the Minister for Manpower a question related to the issue of overtime pay. The Minister provided a somewhat helpful reply, though the number he cited was still a far cry from the number of cases we see each year at TWC2.

The bigger issues raised by our article remain unaddressed. They are about whether all salary violations reported by workers to TADM are automatically referred to the enforcement branch, and whether such reports from one or a handful of workers trigger a wider audit of a company’s salary practices vis-à-vis other employees.

The parliamentary question and answer is given below and can also be seen here: https://www.mom.gov.sg/newsroom/parliament-questions-and-replies/2025/0204-written-answer-to-pq-on-under-reporting-of-overtime-hours-by-employers

4 February 2025

Question by He Ting Ru, Member of Parliament – To ask the Minister for Manpower (a) whether the Ministry tracks the prevalence of deliberate under-reporting of overtime hours by employers of non-domestic migrant workers; and (b) what penalties are typically meted out against employers who provide inaccurate payslips.

Answer –  The Ministry of Manpower (MOM) tracks non-compliance with overtime pay requirements that are detected through complaints or inspections. These include cases where the employer under-reports the overtime hours worked or underpaid for the overtime worked. For breaches of overtime regulations due to lack of knowledge, MOM will generally take an educational approach and employers will cooperate to rectify the breach. For egregious cases, we take a strong stance against any infringements. We will take enforcement action, which can include fines and prosecution. For employers who provide inaccurate payslips, MOM can issue caution letters or impose administrative penalties of $100 for the first breach and $200 for the subsequent breach. In the past 5 years, on average per year, MOM took action against about 40 employers for under or non-provision of overtime pay and against about 10 employers for issuing inaccurate payslips. Employees who are not paid for their overtime work or who are given inaccurate payslips are advised to approach MOM for assistance or the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management (TADM) to file claims.

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