Income Tax Act

(Original Enactment: Ordinance 39 of 1947)

(30th April 1996)
An Act to impose a tax upon incomes and to regulate the collection thereof.
[1st January 1948]
Short title
1.  This Act may be cited as the Income Tax Act.
2.—(1)  In this Act, unless the subject or context otherwise requires —
“accountant” means a public accountant within the meaning of the Accountants Act;
“advocate and solicitor” means an advocate and solicitor within the meaning of the Legal Profession Act [Cap. 161];
“annual value” has the same meaning as in section 2 of the Property Tax Act [Cap. 254] and shall be ascertained in the same manner as annual value is ascertained under that Act;
“approved pension or provident fund or society” means a pension or provident fund or society approved by the Comptroller under section 5;
“basis period” for any year of assessment means the period on the profits of which tax for that year falls to be assessed;
“body of persons” means any body politic, corporate or collegiate, any corporation sole and any fraternity, fellowship or society of persons whether corporate or not corporate but does not include a company or a partnership;
“Commonwealth” in relation to a country, means any country recognised by the President to be a Commonwealth country and “part of the Commonwealth” means any Commonwealth country, colony, protectorate or protected state or any other territory administered by the government of any Commonwealth country;
“company” means any company incorporated or registered under any law in force in Singapore or elsewhere;
“Comptroller” means the Comptroller of Income Tax appointed under section 5 and includes, for all purposes of this Act except the exercise of the powers conferred upon the Comptroller by sections 45(7), 67(1) (a), 95, 96 and 101, a Deputy Comptroller or an Assistant Comptroller so appointed;
“crops” includes any form of vegetable produce;
“earned income” means the statutory income of an individual or a Hindu joint family, reduced by any deduction made under section 37(2)(a) from —
(a)gains or profits from any trade, business, profession, vocation or employment on which tax is payable under section 10(1), where the Comptroller is satisfied that such gains or profits are immediately derived from the carrying on or exercise by such individual or Hindu joint family, as the case may be, of such trade, business, profession, vocation or employment; and
(b)any pension on which tax is payable under section 10(1)(e) given to the individual in respect of the past services of such individual or any deceased individual;
“employee”  —
(a)in relation to a company, includes a director of the company; and
(b)in relation to a statutory board, includes the chairman and any member of the statutory board,
and “employer” and other cognate expressions shall be construed accordingly;
“employment pass” means an employment pass issued by the Controller of Immigration under the Immigration Regulations (Cap.133, Rg 1);
“executor” means any executor, administrator or other person administering the estate of a deceased person;
“goods” includes currency and specie;
“harvesting” includes the collection of crops, however effected;
“Hindu joint family” means what in any system of law prevailing in India is known as a Hindu joint family or a co-parcenary;
“incapacitated person” means any infant, lunatic, idiot or insane person;
“local forces” means the Singapore Armed Forces and any volunteer or reserve forces attached thereto;
“permanent establishment” means a fixed place where a business is wholly or partly carried on including —
(a)a place of management;
(b)a branch;
(c)an office;
(d)a factory;
(e)a warehouse;
(f)a workshop;
(g)a farm or plantation;
(h)a mine, oil well, quarry or other place of extraction of natural resources;
(i)a building or work site or a construction, installation or assembly project,
and without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing, a person shall be deemed to have a permanent establishment in Singapore if that person —
(j)carries on supervisory activities in connection with a building or work site or a construction, installation or assembly project; or
(k)has another person acting on that person’s behalf in Singapore who —
(i)has and habitually exercises an authority to conclude contracts;
(ii)maintains a stock of goods or merchandise for the purpose of delivery on behalf of that person; or
(iii)habitually secures orders wholly or almost wholly for that person or for such other enterprises as are controlled by that person;
“person” includes a company, body of persons and a Hindu joint family;
“plantation” means any land used for the growing and harvesting of crops;
“prescribed” means prescribed by rules or regulations made under this Act;
“professional visit pass” means a professional visit pass issued by the Controller of Immigration under the Immigration Regulations (Cap. 133, Rg 1);
“replanting” means the replacement of the crop of any product on any area of land by the planting on the same area —
(a)of a crop of the same product; or
(b)of a crop of a different product approved by the Minister;
“research and development” means any systematic or intensive study carried out in the field of science or technology with the object of using the results of the study for the production or improvement of materials, devices, products, produce, or processes, but does not include —
(a)quality control or routine testing of materials, devices or products;
(b)research in the social sciences or the humanities;
(c)routine data collection;
(d)efficiency surveys or management studies; or
(e)market research or sales promotion;
“research and development organisation” means a body or an organisation which provides research and development services for any trade or business;
“resident in Singapore”  —
(a)in relation to an individual, means a person who, in the year preceding the year of assessment, resides in Singapore except for such temporary absences therefrom as may be reasonable and not inconsistent with a claim by such person to be resident in Singapore, and includes a person who is physically present or who exercises an employment (other than as a director of a company) in Singapore for 183 days or more during the year preceding the year of assessment; and
(b)in relation to a company or body of persons, means a company or body of persons the control and management of whose business is exercised in Singapore;
“return” includes an electronic return under section 71A;
“tax” means the income tax imposed by this Act;
“work permit” means a work permit issued by the Controller of Work Permits under the Employment of Foreign Workers Act (Cap. 91A);
“year of assessment” means the period of 12 months commencing on such date as the Minister may, by notification in the Gazette, appoint, and each subsequent period of 12 months.1
1  1st January, 1948 was appointed: see G.N. No. S 433/47.
(2)  For the purposes of this Act, where an individual is present in Singapore for any part of a day his presence on that day shall be counted as one day.