When Must Salary Be Paid in Singapore?

Salary must be paid at least once a month, and within 7 days after the end of the salary period — so a May payroll is due by 7 June. Overtime gets 14 days. Those clocks come from the Employment Act, enforced by MOM, and they tighten sharply when an employee leaves.

Last reviewed 10 June 2026 · Source: Ministry of Manpower (Employment Act).

Who these deadlines cover

The Employment Act's salary rules protect employees — anyone working under a contract of service, full-time or part-time, local or foreign. A freelancer invoicing you under a contract for service sits outside them: her payment terms are whatever the invoice and contract say, 30 days included.

The line matters because it cuts both ways. Calling a de-facto employee a "contractor" does not switch off the 7-day rule — MOM looks at the working relationship, not the label on the agreement.

If someone works your roster, under your direction, with your equipment, treat their pay date as statutory — the substance of the arrangement decides it, not the heading on the contract.

The two clocks for an ongoing employee

Payment	Deadline
Ordinary salary	Within 7 days after the salary period ends
Overtime pay	Within 14 days after the salary period ends

A calendar-month salary period ending 31 May means salary lands by 7 June and any OT for May by 14 June. You may pay more often than monthly — weekly, fortnightly — but each period's pay still carries its own 7-day clock.

Paying on the last working day of the month, as most Singapore SMEs do, clears the deadline with a week to spare. The 7 days are a ceiling, not a target.

What happens if you pay late

Salary unpaid within 7 days of the due date is a breach of contract under the Employment Act. That gives the employee grounds to treat the contract as broken — and a straightforward claim at the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management or the Employment Claims Tribunals.

For a micro-SME the practical damage is faster than the legal one: a payroll that slips even once is the single quickest way to lose a 5-person team's trust. Cash-flow timing belongs in your payment terms with customers, not in your payroll date.

Final salary — the deadline depends on how they leave

The 7-day rule does not apply to a departing employee. MOM's standards split it by exit scenario:

Situation	Final salary due
Resignation, notice served	On the last day of employment
Resignation, no notice	Within 7 days of the last day
Dismissal for misconduct	Last day, or within 3 working days if not possible
Employer terminates	Last day, or within 3 working days if not possible

Resignation with notice served means payday is the last day. No grace period.

The asymmetry is deliberate: an employee who served proper notice gave you a full notice period to prepare the final payrun, so the law expects it ready on day one. Only the no-notice walkout earns you 7 days.

What the final payment must include

The final payrun is a normal payrun plus the exit items: salary up to the last day, pro-rated allowances, any overtime owed, and encashment of unused annual leave where it applies. It also still needs a complete itemised payslip — on termination, the payslip must be given together with the outstanding salary, not three days later.

CPF on the final month follows the normal rules — contributions are due for the month of the last salary payment like any other, on the usual CPF schedule.

The statutory calendar for a monthly payroll

For a salary period that runs with the calendar month, the recurring deadlines stack like this:

Date	Obligation
Last working day (typical)	Pay salary; give the itemised payslip with it
By the 7th of the next month	Statutory deadline for that month's salary
By the 14th of the next month	Statutory deadline for overtime pay; CPF contributions due

Paying on the last working day clears every salary clock at once and leaves the 7-day window as buffer for a failed GIRO run or a bank holiday — which is exactly what a statutory buffer is for.

Salary periods shorter than a month

Nothing requires a monthly cycle. A salary period can be weekly or fortnightly — common for F&B and retail crews — and each period carries its own 7-day clock from its own end date. A week ending Sunday must be paid by the following Sunday.

What you cannot do is stretch a period past a month. "At least once a month" is the floor, and a quarterly-paid retainer for an employee under a contract of service does not comply, whatever the contract says.

Put the final-salary scenarios in your offboarding checklist rather than your memory — the last-day deadline arrives exactly when you are busiest with a handover.