iPad Stands: Upgrading your IT infrastructure

Posted on May 20, 2015 by Pragya Gupta

As a tech company, we can’t help but be biased towards cool gadgets and handy apps to boost your productivity. I mean, who even uses paper to take orders at a restaurant anymore?! As a college going kid, I don’t remember the last time I split a bill with a friend using cash. There’s DBS PayLah! for things like that. Paper money?! No way.

You’ve heard it a billion times before: ramping up your IT infrastructure is imperative to taking your business to the next level. Which is why I think this post is essential among our daily PayrollHero blog bites. We won’t be talking about the obvious benefits of revamping your POS systems. What we want to talk about are supporting systems that enable you to do it while looking cool and classy, all at the same time.

The iPad stands for your POS systems require special designing, based on your customers’ ergonomic needs. The most beautiful designs are simple, customizable in order to attach a card reader and focus on the function taking place between the customer and the iPad. The iPad stand can be used for the following:

Restaurants: For customers to reserve tables and order from the menu while waiting in line for tables.

Retail: To facilitate the POS function of iPads. The stand also can be used at strategic locations to encourage customers to participate in promotions or to give more information about a certain product.

Hotels: For self-check in and check out procedures at the door.

heckler design ipad stand for restaurants Let’s go deeper into the designs that suit the above functionalities. Heckler Design’s WindFall Stand is perfect for retailers. With the minimalist design, the stand is sleek and manages to hide all those cumbersome wires, giving a classy and professional look. Depending on the functionality, the WindFall designs include long kiosk stands or frames that can be attached to the wall.

Armodilo_DTC Armodilo is an award winning company that manufactures iPad stands. The designs are simple and smart. They are versatile and can be used for a wide range of functions. The most interesting design is Armadilo’s Sphere. The stand is attached to a desktop surface and can swivel 90 degrees with an optional rotational base. The stand gives a quirky and fun element to the atmosphere, making it a great design for café’s and casual dining locations.

The Square line of iPad stands is clean and the most cost effective. While the customizable features of the stands are limited, the Square design has an inbuilt card reader. It is perfect for users that have already implemented the Square POS software.

The market for iPad stands is relatively new. As the market grows, the functionality of these stands will also expand, making the stand an indispensable part of daily business operations.

Our Top 5 Singapore Food Bloggers

Posted on May 19, 2015 by Pragya Gupta

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Singaporeans are proud of the food scene in the city. And rightly so. With an array of vibrant and diverse options, Singapore blends Asian with Western flavours and goes beyond conventional rules of any cuisine. For restauranteurs without a well-known name on the sign board, it can be difficult to establish themselves as a unique option for customers.

The tech savvy culture in Singapore can be used as a tool for just that. Singaporeans trust food bloggers for their culinary adventures. There are plenty of accredited bloggers out there but we have got some solid advice on whom to follow. Subscribing to these bloggers will help you understand the Singapore culinary environment better so that you can position your restaurant and attract the right customers.

The bloggers mentioned here are in no particular order. We have picked these based on top hits on Google and based on what other bloggers say about them.

LadyIronChef: Personally, this blog has never failed me. LadyIronChef gets it right with its ‘Best Of…’ lists that give you many options for your particular craving: be it a casual Sunday brunch or a late night ice-cream indulgence. As a restauranteur, this is the perfect place to see what other restaurants in your cuisine are doing differently and how they are performing. This blog also gets the highest number of views.
ishootieatipost: This is an award winning blog about Singapore food. From hawker stalls to gourmet dining, this blog has it all. The unique feature in this blog is that you can find featured restaurants based on location. Dr. Leslie Tay, founder of ieatishootipost, has been writing this blog for nearly a decade now and is influential in critiquing food in Singapore. The stunning shots of the dishes taken by Dr. Tay add to the appeal of this blog.
Six&Seven: This blog leans towards fine dining. With a great interface and beautiful pictures, this is a site you want to be featured in if you are trying to get noticed as a restaurant that believes in art just as much as flavour.
DanielFoodDiary: This blog ranks second in terms of number of views per month which makes it a trusted site among foodies. This site is not restricted by fine dining or hawker stalls. It has a wide range of posts about every cuisine available in Singapore. DanielFoodDiary is a great resource for research on food in Singapore because of the sheer wealth of information on the site.
MissTamChiak: This site is very popular for the personal stories told by the blogger: Miss Maureen. It makes for a great read and is highly rated in terms of traffic. The blog explores all aspects of food. It has recipes and lessons on food photography, along with reviews on largely Asian cuisines.

Hope this helps!

Singapore Corporate Taxes101

Posted on May 15, 2015 by Pragya Gupta

Singapore Corporate Taxes101 Filing taxes can be a daunting task. Figuring out deductions and what your company is exempted from is complicated enough before you realise that it’s a new financial year, the rules have changed, and now you’re not under the same tax exemptions anymore. We looked around the interwebs for a while and we were stumped. So we decided this problem needs to be fixed.

Over the years, the Singapore government has tried to make the country a tax friendly one for corporates. With a bunch of nifty exemptions, retailers, restauranteurs and growing businesses can breathe a sigh of relief. The government’s got your back. Let’s get down to some important pointers for you to file taxes for your company.

Important Facts:

Rate: The current corporate tax rate is 17%.
Dates:
- Within 3 months of the company’s financial year end, the Estimated Chargeable Income document must be filed and submitted
- Every year in April, the IRAS sends Forms C-S or Form C filing package.
- 30 November: The Paper version of the Corporate Income Tax Form (Forms C-S or Form C) must be submitted. 15 December: The e-File Form of the same document must be submitted. Either the paper or the electronic version must be submitted.
- FormIR8A, which is a statement of an employee’s remuneration, must be issued for each employee by 1 March of every year.
- Your company needs to keep records of transactions for a minimum of 5 years. They must be submitted to IRAS upon request.
Use mytax.iras.gov.sg to file your company’s taxes, check or post objections to your tax assessment and apply for exemptions.
Taxes can be paid via internet banking, SAM, AXS station, Cash/NETS or GIRO.

Estimated Chargeable Income: Are you exempted?

The ECI is used to estimate your company’s taxable income. The IRAS notifies you before your ECI file is due. However, as a tax break, if your ECI is zero or your annual revenue is $1 million or less, then you do not have to submit the ECI, even if you have received a notification for it.

The ECI can be filed at mytax.iras.gov.sg. The government will then notify you on the exact tax amount which you have to pay within a month of the notice.

Corporate Income Tax Form

This is the big one. Here is where you declare your actual income in the financial year. It needs to be filed regardless of what your income looks like. There are two types: Form C-S and Form C. For a company with revenue not more than $1 million, Form C-S must be filed.

Exemptions

This is the part we have all been waiting for. With these exemptions, the government makes it easier on a start-up’s cashflows for a few years at least. Go through it because there is some good news for retailers as well.

Tax Exemptions for Start-ups: Start-up companies enjoy 100% tax exemption for the first $100,000 of chargeable income for 3 years. Another 50% exemption can be exercised on the next $200,000 which effectively means the tax rate is 8.5%.

Partial Tax Exemption: From the fourth year onwards, start-ups can exercise the Partial Tax Exemption. Here, 75% of the first $10,000 is exempted and another 50% on the next $290,000 is exempted.

Expenses before starting your business: The government also exempts taxes on expenses incurred the year before your company’s financial year in which you start your business. For example, if you financial year starts in Jan 1 2014 and your first earnings were on June 1 2014, then you will be exempted on paying taxes for expenses incurred between Jan 1 2013 and Dec 31 2013.

Capital Allowances: This one is great for retailers. You are given a capital allowance on fixed assets like electrical equipment, furniture and other fixtures for you company. This is in place of depreciation which is non-deductible.

E-Commerce

Retailers that create income through e-commerce websites have a set of rules that they need to follow. For a franchisee or a branch in Singapore with a franchisor based in a foreign country, the income generated by a website is not liable to taxation in Singapore. This is true even is the company’s customers are in Singapore or not. Check the links below for more details on taxation on e-commerce-centred business.

We hope this was helpful to you! We have put in some great links with guides to fill up your corporate tax forms. Do comment or drop in your email for more handy information!

Basic Corporate Tax Calculator: https://www.iras.gov.sg/irashome/page.aspx?id=6784

Disclaimer: As always, consult your lawyer or accountant for advice! We are here to help, but your specific situation should be reviewed by a professional with complete knowledge of your situation.

Crash Course for Hiring a Singapore Intern

Posted on May 14, 2015 by Pragya Gupta

Editors Note: Introducing Pragya Gupta, Business Development Intern at the PayrollHero Singapore office. She will be contributing to the PayrollHero blog from time to time.

“To get a job you need experience; to get experience, you need a job.”

That pretty much sums up a college kid’s life-crisis. Enter: internships.

Singapore Payroll I am an intern at PayrollHero. Today marks the second day of my internship. I have been studying in a university in Singapore over the last two years. The importance of internships cannot be stressed enough to a college student. Universities even have an internship requirement that must be completed in order to graduate. So it is worth exploring how this works and what both parties, the intern and the company are required to do.

Internships, in general, are quite a messy affair. The first question that should/would strike anyone is: Why should I hire you? You’re just a kid, probably not a smart one, probably irresponsible and probably not good at what I need to get done. Most importantly, I am going to spend all these resources on you for two months or more, just to see you walk out that door by the end of it. What’s the point?

Great question. So here is the thing: companies take two or three months to train their newly hired staff just so they can get used to the way things work. And while that is true for interns as well, some companies use internship programmes to really judge how good a student is in order to hire them once they have graduated. By this time most of the training is already done and the company can be sure that the student fits the bill. Other companies need interns to help them with a particular project. In both cases, it’s a cost effective way to get things done. To give you a student’s perspective: an intern is always excited to do something new and get some experience. It is mutually beneficial, if all goes well.

Step 1: Who Can You Hire?

The Ministry of Manpower states rules that are different for a local student and an international student studying in a local university and looking for an internship. Local students in universities do not have binding requirements on the hours that they can work during term time. As an international student, I have a Student Pass that is valid for four years of college. During the term, I can work part-time for only 16 hours a week regardless of where I work: banks, startups, the neighbourhood Subway, anywhere. During holidays, there is no solid requirement that prevents me to work.

Leave of Absence: A student may take a Leave Of Absence for an entire term in order to get some internship experience, which can be a full-time internship. For an international student, this is possible only if the university’s internship requirement has not been completed. For a local student, the LOA has no binding requirement.

Step 2: Where Do You Look For Interns?

I applied for an internship using the standard internship search portals: StartupJobs.Asia, internsSG, the university jobs portal. Usually companies post about internship positions on these websites. Some of these companies partner up with universities and post job positions through the university portal or email. Some internships are structured while others are spontaneous and depend on the project that the company is currently working on. Companies specify the job scope in the search portals. PayrollHero worked a bit differently. It was featured on one of these sites. I clicked on the website, loved the look and content and decided to email them.

Step 3: Details, Payment, Contracts

The job applications have been posted; you have called the applicants in for an interview; you have picked a prospective intern. What’s next? Once an intern is hired, a contract must be drawn up. The contract specifies what the job requirement is, the number of weeks in the internship, number of hours in a day and the amount that the intern will be paid. An intern is covered by the Employment Act that entitles him or her to a stipend, a fixed number of hours and a few more entitlements (check links below). A regular internship is anywhere between 8 to 10 weeks. The regular stipend is between SGD800 and SGD1200 a month, depending on the hours and the job scope and excluding over-time pay. SPRING Singapore is an agency that supports SMEs to fund internships for local students. This is a good resource in case businesses have trouble paying for interns.

If the internship position was posted on the university portal, then the company and the university liaise together and the university directly clocks in the weeks for the student. In a self-sourced internship, if the student wants to clock in weeks, he or she keeps the university in the loop and they contact the company for details. Some universities require forms to be filled for the internship to be approved. Once the internship ends, the university sends a feedback form to the company for details on how the internship went and how the student performed.

Finally, internships are a great way to get people to know about your company. When a company ties up with a university, it can participate in career fairs and feature in promotional emails that the university sends out. Students get a chance to gain some experience and build skills for their future jobs. All in all, Singapore has a straightforward infrastructure set up to hire interns which makes it a worthy option for companies to explore the existing talent pool.

Happy Hiring!

For More Information:

Employment Act and who it covers: http://www.mom.gov.sg/employment-practices/employment-act/who-is-covered

Hours of work, over time pay and rest day: http://www.mom.gov.sg/employment-practices/hours-of-work-overtime-and-rest-days

SPRING Singapore: http://www.spring.gov.sg/Growing-Business/Grant/development-areas/Pages/HCD-SME-Talent-Programme-for-students.aspx