We went through it ourselves.This site is what we wish we had read first.
Red Dot People plans how you set up and run a business in Singapore. We write the plan, work out which licensed firm fits your case, and introduce you. The firm does the work from there. We say how we are paid while we do it.
Independent advisory for setting up and running a business in Singapore
Red Dot People is an independent advisory for foreign founders and companies setting up, hiring and running a business in Singapore. Within one business day it writes a free plan covering incorporation, work passes, employer of record and accounting, and introduces the licensed firm that fits best.
- Website
- reddotpeople.com
- Serves
- Singapore
- [email protected]
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A freelancer's question, answered the long way.
It started with a Dutch founder who needed a company that clients, banks and tax advisers in three countries would take seriously. The first answer was Estonia's e-Residency. It was cheap and easy and, a few years on, a headache: thin banking, a distribution tax, and a Dutch adviser asking where the company was really managed.
Singapore was the second answer. A self-serve platform did the first incorporation. A corporate services firm runs the companies now, including the Singapore holding company we set up with them. Along the way we paid for a nominee director, waited on a bank, scored a COMPASS application and switched accountant once. Every price on this site comes from that experience or from a provider's current list.
The site exists because the question we kept getting from other founders was the question we had asked: what do I actually need, what does it cost, and who should do it? Providers answer with their own product. We answer with a written plan: a route, a number and a firm for each step, and we are paid by the firm you go ahead with.
We plan it and find the fit. Licensed firms do the work.
We do
- Write your plan: the structure, the steps in order, what each costs and how long it takes, and what you can skip
- Work out which firm fits your case, and name an alternative if you want cheaper or more hands-on
- Say what you do not need yet, including things we would be paid for
- Send one introduction, with your plan attached, when you say go
Licensed firms and banks do
- File with ACRA and act as your corporate secretary
- Act as your nominee director until you have your own resident director
- Prepare and submit your Employment Pass application
- Employ your staff, run payroll and pay CPF
- Keep your accounts and file your tax returns
- Open your business account, which is the bank, usually after the firm introduces you
- Be your contact from the introduction on, for everything they do
We are not tax advisers. Where your home country's tax rules matter, your plan says which question to take to an adviser there.
The rules we choose firms by, and drop them by.
Licensed for what they do
Incorporation and corporate secretarial work only through ACRA registered filing agents. Employment only through firms that employ under the Employment Act and pay CPF correctly.
Used before, and it went as quoted
We or someone we introduced has used them, and the work and the price matched the quote.
A written price list
They give us their prices in writing and quote you from them. You pay what you would pay going direct.
A reply within a business day
To you, not only to us. If the people we introduce wait longer than that, we hear about it.
An alternative for every route
No single firm gets every introduction. Your plan names the one we would use and the one we would use if you want something different.
We stop when it goes wrong
After repeated complaints we stop introducing a firm.
The firm pays us. Your price stays the same.
The firm you go ahead with pays us a share of its fee. You pay the firm's normal price, the same as going direct. Your plan names the firm and what it pays us.
The plan is yours either way. If you take it and go direct, that is fine. If the right answer earns us nothing, and for a freelancer staying in Europe it often does, you get that answer anyway.
Four kinds of provider. Named once we know your situation.
- Managed corporate services
- Licensed firms
- Incorporation, nominee director, secretary, Employment Pass, accounting. For founders and companies who want one firm to handle it.
- Self-serve incorporation
- Online platforms
- Right for Singapore residents and for simple one-person companies.
- Employer of record
- Several platforms
- For citizens and permanent residents. Named in your plan, chosen on price and how they handle CPF and the Employment Act.
- Hiring abroad
- Employer-of-record platforms
- For Singapore companies hiring outside Singapore. Named in your plan, for the country you are hiring in.
Tell us what you're trying to do. We'll tell you what we'd do.
Two minutes on the form. A written plan within one business day, from one of the people who set up our own Singapore companies.