You must provide an office address when you submit an application to incorporate a local company. A registered office address is where all communications and notices to the company are addressed to, and where the company’s registers and records are kept.

Requirements of Registered Office Addresses

All companies must ensure that their registered office is open and accessible to the public for at least three hours during ordinary business hours on each business day. A business day is any day excluding Saturday, Sunday and public holidays.

The purpose of this requirement is to allow members of the public to reach out to the office if necessary and to facilitate the delivery of any legal documents. Companies and directors that fail to comply with this requirement may be fined up to S$5,000.

The registered office must be an address in Singapore, but it need not be the place of operation. For instance, your company’s registered office address may be in Raffles Place but your factory could be located in Tuas.

Home Office Scheme

If you plan to conduct a small-scale business from your home, you may use your residential address as the office address under the Home Office Scheme managed by the Housing Development Board (for HDB flats) and Urban Redevelopment Authority (for private residential properties). This scheme is available to owners, tenants and authorised occupants of housing units.

You must apply for approval under the Home Office Scheme before submitting your application to incorporate your company.

Find out more about the qualifying criteria and application process:

Updating Changes to the Registered Office Address

The Companies Act requires all companies to ensure that information on the company in ACRA’s registers is up-to-date. This includes the registered office address. This ensures that your company remains reachable and can continue to receive correspondences from government agencies, business partners and stakeholders.

Any updates to ACRA must be done within 14 days from the effective date of change. You can update your registered office address by filing a “Change in Company Information including Appointment/Cessation of Company Officers/Auditors in Bizfile+.

Companies and directors that fail to comply with this requirement may be fined up to S$5,000. Find out more on updating your company’s information.

Read the case studies (PDF, 120KB) which illustrate the importance of maintaining a valid registered office address.

 

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