A tax invoice is necessary, not sufficient. Eight conditions decide what goes in Box 7, and a claim that fails one comes back with a penalty of up to twice the tax

No. Regulation 27 of the GST (General) Regulations blocks the input tax on buying, leasing or hiring a motor car and on everything bought directly for it, including petrol, parking, servicing and insurance, however the car is used and whether it is registered to the company or an individual. A motor car is one built for up to seven passengers excluding the driver and weighing up to 3,000 kg unladen. Vans, lorries, buses and motorcycles are outside the definition, so their purchase and running costs can be claimed on the usual conditions, as can taxis, driving-school cars, cars bought by a dealer or rental company for sale or hire, and chauffeured private hire cars used in a chauffeur business, among the vehicles the definition excludes. Two narrower exceptions exist: since 1 January 2023 the costs of a car used by an unconnected third party, such as a customer's parking at your premises, though not a car used by you, your staff or a connected person, and the fare for a chauffeured ride bought from a business that provides them, including a ride-hailing trip, which is claimable with a tax invoice from the operator.

Generally not. Regulation 26 blocks medical expenses incurred for staff and medical and accident insurance premiums for them, and Regulation 25(3) counts directors, officers and managers as staff for this purpose. The exceptions are narrow: expenses and cover that the Work Injury Compensation Act or a collective agreement makes obligatory, such as the required work injury insurance and pre-employment or annual screening that the Act requires; and, for expenses incurred on or after 1 October 2021, treatment that written law requires because of the nature of the work or the work environment, or COVID-19 treatment required under a Government advisory, in each case where the Comptroller is satisfied the work required it. A general workplace health programme or an advisory about anything other than COVID-19 does not bring a medical bill inside these exceptions. Two things sit outside the block altogether: a medical assessment of a job candidate's suitability, made as part of hiring, which IRAS allows on the ordinary conditions, and first-aid kits, test kits and protective equipment bought for employees. An annual check-up for an existing employee stays blocked unless one of the exceptions applies.

In two situations. The first is agency: the business can show that the employee was acting as its agent in receiving the goods or services, for which an expense policy, an approved claim and a reimbursement are the usual evidence. The second is IRAS's administrative concession for fringe benefits contracted in the employee's own name, such as a mobile phone plan, a professional membership or an educational course, where the employee is unlikely to be an agent: the business can still claim if it reimburses the employee and records the cost as a business expense, and since 1 July 2025 the same applies to such benefits bought from an overseas supplier registered under the Overseas Vendor Registration regime, with documents showing the GST charged. In both cases the GST on any private use is not claimable, a partly reimbursed bill is claimed in proportion, and where the business and private shares of a mobile plan cannot be established IRAS's e-Tax Guide on fringe benefits allows 4/7 of the GST on a fully reimbursed bill, or the lower of 9/109 of the amount reimbursed and 4/7 of the GST on a partly reimbursed one. The purchase still has to pass the other conditions, so an employee's petrol receipt or club fee stays blocked whoever paid it.

A shorter tax invoice a supplier may issue where the total payable including GST does not exceed S$1,000. It needs six items: the supplier's name, address and GST registration number, the date, an identifying number, a description of what was supplied, the total payable including GST, and a statement such as "price payable includes GST". A till receipt or sales voucher that carries all six qualifies; a receipt that does not, or a supply above S$1,000 on anything but a full tax invoice with the customer's name and address, does not support a claim. IRAS makes one concession, for food and drink entertainment: a receipt with the six items can support a claim above S$1,000 if the business also keeps evidence of payment and a note of who was entertained, who paid and why, and the bill is for food and drink alone; a staff meal is a fringe benefit rather than entertainment, and the family-benefit and private-use rules still apply.

Yes, within limits. Goods bought in the six months before registration qualify if they are still held on the registration date; goods bought earlier qualify if they were not used or supplied before it, with equipment already in use apportioned. Rent, utilities and services qualify if they were incurred within six months before registration and are not directly attributable to supplies made before it. Costs a founder paid before incorporation count as the company's where the founder became a member, officer or employee, was reimbursed in full or given an undertaking to be, was not GST-registered and bought them for the company's business, and the company writes to IRAS for approval before claiming them. All the usual conditions still apply, IRAS publishes a self-review checklist to complete and keep, and the claim is made in the first GST return only, with the GST in Box 7, the purchase value in Box 5 and a declaration of the amount in Box 12, which is open only on that return; it cannot be added to a later return, and the next-return concession does not cover it.

Usually, yes. An input tax claim that was omitted is an error in the filed return, and IRAS allows errors to be corrected within five years of the end of the period they belong to. If the net GST in error across all the affected periods is S$3,000 or less, and the other-box errors are within 5% of each affected return's total supplies (Box 4, or Box 5 where no supplies were made), the missed invoice can be added to Box 5 and Box 7 of the next return. Above those limits, request a GST F7 on myTax Portal and file it within 14 days. Either way the invoice has to meet the ordinary conditions, so it must be a valid tax invoice addressed to the business, for the business, and not a blocked expense; and a missed pre-registration claim is different, because pre-registration GST can be claimed in the first return only.

The claim is made on the invoice date, so paying the supplier is not a condition at the time. But if the supplier is still unpaid 12 months after the payment due date, the business must repay the input tax to IRAS by reducing Box 5 and Box 7 in the return for the period in which the 12 months ran out, in proportion to the part still unpaid. If the supplier is paid later, the input tax can be claimed again, provided the payment is made within five years of the end of the period in which it was first claimed.

No, and IRAS says not to work out either box from the other. Box 5 is the value, before GST, of the standard-rated purchases and imports on which the GST can be claimed, plus zero-rated purchases; Box 7 is that GST, plus any refunds claimed such as bad debt relief. Expenses whose input tax is blocked, private spending and purchases from suppliers who are not GST-registered belong in neither box. A business that fills both boxes correctly may find Box 7 close to 9% of Box 5, and that proves nothing either way: zero-rated purchases carry no GST, an import's Box 7 figure is the GST on the permit while its Box 5 value may be the permit value or the supplier's invoice value if the two can be reconciled, and a partly private bill goes in at its business share. What IRAS asks for is that each line's value and its claimable GST are tracked separately; the boxes then follow from the ledger, and 9% of the whole purchase ledger, which is the shortcut in the worked quarter, is wrong because the ledger includes everything the boxes leave out.

An incorrect GST return can be penalised under section 59 of the GST Act by up to two times the tax undercharged, with a fine of up to S$5,000 and up to three years' imprisonment on conviction, on top of repaying the tax; that is the statutory maximum, and what IRAS imposes depends on the facts and the degree of care, while wilful evasion carries up to four times. Coming forward first changes that. Under IRAS's Voluntary Disclosure Programme, a disclosure that is accurate, complete and made before IRAS raises a query or starts an audit carries no incorrect-return penalty if it is made on a GST F7 within one year of the statutory filing deadline of the return, and IRAS's F7 guidance adds that no late payment penalty is imposed on the GST disclosed within that year either. After the year, the incorrect-return penalty is a flat 5% of the GST undercharged, and because the GST itself was due a month after the period a 5% late payment penalty may be charged on it as well. The correction is filed on a GST F7, or in the next return where the error is within the concession limits.