FAQ FOR FIRST TIME PREPARERS OF FINANCIAL STATEMENTS AND AGM FILING
Please contact us via email or our office line at 6333 0633 for your Accounting and/or AGM matters.
WHAT YOU NEED TO DO BEFORE YOUR AGM
(usually due approximately 6 months’ time from your Financial Year End Date)
STEPS FOR FILING YOUR AGM ANNUAL RETURN with CONTACTONE PROFESSIONAL SERVICES
EASY AGM COMPLIANCE IN 4 SIMPLE STEPS
Step 1 : Finalize your Accounts for the Financial Year and prepare your Financial Statements.
Step 2 : Send in a copy of your approved and signed financial statements or certified management accounts to ContactOne Professional Services.
Step 3 : ContactOne will prepare your AGM filing documents for the signatures of the directors and shareholders.
Step 4 : Send in your original signed copies of the AGM documents prepared for you and ContactOne will follow up with the Annual Return Filing.
Step 5 : [ONLY FOR INSOLVENT AND/OR COMPANIES REQUIRED TO SUBMIT AUDITED ACCOUNTS] As you are required to file XBRL version of your financial statements, we will need your financial statements prior to Annual Return filing (Certified Management Accounts WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED). We can provide XBRL conversion services for a service fee.
NEW MEASURES BY THE REGULATORY BOARD [Directors Please Take Note]
Directors of non-compliant companies may be issued with an ACRA letter to attend a Directors’ Compliance Program (DCP). Once you receive this letter, you must register and attend the course, failing which you may be liable for prosecution without offer for composition. Please note that directors will incur applicable course fees for the attendance of the DCP program.
FILE ON TIME TO AVOID LATE FILING PENALTIES!
Kindly note that late filing of your annual return to ACRA will result in a penalty/composition fee payable to the authorities (See Table)
Updated wef 1 December 2015
| Offence | Estimated Fee Penalty (regardless of length of default) |
| Did Not File Annual Return Within One Month of AGM Date (S197) |
$300 |
| Did Not Hold AGM on Time (S175) |
$300 |
| Accounts Presented at AGM is more than 6 months old* when AGM is held (S201) |
$300 |
* Applicable to private companies only. For listed companies, accounts presented at AGM cannot be more than 4 months old.
Please note that the penalties shown above are calculated based on the non-compliance for each section that you breached. Therefore, if you have breached 2 sections, your penalty will be calculated based on the length of default for each section.
Stepped Up Enforcement Actions:
There are 3 levels of enforcement actions that can be taken by the authority. Please note that Stepped Up Enforcement Actions will result in additional composition sums to be paid and are ON TOP of the sums incurred based on the penalty table illustrated as above.
For the avoidance of doubt, ACRA has the discretion NOT to offer any offer of Compostion to the Directors and the Company.
Prior to Issuance of Summons: ACRA will contact the Directors and the Company to provide an offer of composition amounting to $300 for each breach of S175 and S197 (Total $600 for both breaches).
Issuance of Summons: ACRA will issue a Summons for the Directors and the Company to answer to the breaches of S175 and S197 and provide an offer of composition amounting to $600 for each breach of S175 and S197. The Directors, if failing to pay the offer of composition on time, may be required (mandatory) to attend court to receive the official fine to be paid after the court session.(Total $1,200 for both breaches)
Warrant of Arrest:This will be issued if the Directors did not attend the Court Session to answer to the said charges. An offer of composition amounting to $900 for each breach of S175 and S197 will be offered. If no amount is paid to the authority, the directors will be arrested. (Total $1,800 for both breaches)
Commencing 2016, any directors who have at least 3 companies that are struck off by ACRA (Registrar initiated strike off) within a period of 5 years will be disqualified from acting as a director or taking part in the management of any company for a period of 5 years, commencing from the date where the 3rd company is struck off. The strike off count of 3 does not apply towards voluntary strike-off initiated by the Company.
How to Prevent Late Filing:
Remember the following rules and you will generally be safe.
1. Get your Accounts done up on time! This is often the number 1 reason why AGMs cannot be held/deemed held on time!
2. You must hold an AGM at least ONCE every calendar year.
3. Your AGM cannot be more than 6 months from the end of the financial year for which the accounts need to be presented during the AGM.
4. Your subsequent AGM cannot be more than 15 months from your previous AGM / If this is your first AGM, it must be held within 18 months from the date of incorporation of your company.
5. Try to NOT HOLD YOUR AGM as soon as your financial year has passed if you still have sufficient time to hold one a few months down the road. New company directors tend to assume swift filing is a good thing but it is not always the case for AGM and Annual Returns!
Option to Extend Filing Due Dates
With valid reasons, you may submit a request to extend your filing deadlines by either one month or two months, provided you have valid reasons to do so.
Please note that government fee of $50 – $100 will be applicable for all extension of deadlines. The fees are usually dependent on the duration of extension granted.
FAQ FOR FIRST TIME PREPARERS OF FINANCIAL STATEMENTS AND AGM FILING
01. What are financial statements? Do I need to prepare them?
Financial Statements comprise of Directors’ Report, Statement by Directors, Statement of Financial Position (Balance Sheet), Profit and Loss, Cash-Flow Statement, Statement of Changes in Equity and a list of Accounting Disclosures. Yes every Private Limited Company (“PTE LTD”) need to prepare a set of financial statements in accordance to local regulations.
02. I have maintained my own bookkeeping. Can I send you my bookkeeping records for AGM filing purpose?
You will need to provide us with a copy of your Finalized Financial Statements for us to proceed with your Company AGM Filing. However, in certain cases, we accept, at a minimum, a competently prepared certified profit and loss for the year AND certified Balance Sheet for the year. The requested information is important in your AGM filing as your financial position at year end has implications on the type of AGM filing we will be lodging.
Bookkeeping records are merely transaction recordings of your company performance and additional accounting work needs to be performed to produce a set of financial statements.
03. Can I draft my own copy of financial statements?
Yes you can. There are no regulations preventing you from preparing your own set of financial statements. However, we will only encourage you to do so if you have a certain level of accounting expertise prior to preparing your own copy. Often, we have seen business owners attempt to prepare their own set of financial statements only to realized that the profit and loss categorization is erroneous, the balance sheet does not balance, excludes important information, does not continue from the previous year records, as well as lack of knowledge in understanding how to differentiate between Assets, Liabilities and Equities.
We would like to highlight to business owners that the copy of financial statements represents the final accounting record of your Company and is usually relied upon when performing important tasks such as tax filing, AGM filing, sale of shares/company or securing a bank facility. It is therefore, often relied upon by IRAS, ACRA and other institutional stakeholders. As such, it is pertinent that your financial statements should be prepared in the most accurate and comprehensive manner to ensure you do not run into troubles when you need them the most.
04. Do I need to file my financial statements with ACRA?
Whether you need to file your financial statements with ACRA during AGM filing depends on whether your Company is solvent or insolvent, exempt or Non-exempt. Although filing of accounts may not be necessarily required, as part of the Companies Act, it is required for the Shareholders of the Company to approve the Company accounts during the AGM. Therefore we will need to obtain your Finalized financial statements prior to any AGM filing.
05. Can I get ContactOne Professional Services to assist in the compilation of financial statements?
Yes you can. ContactOne Professional Services provides financial statements compilation and tax filing services for PTE LTD Companies starting from $550 per annum. The final fee is typically dependant on the nature of your business, the completeness of your bookkeeping records, the complexity involved as well as the urgency of the documents. Feel free to contact us to find out more about our accounting services. Please be aware that late requests for accounting work to meet any statutory deadlines may attract a fee premium or may be politely declined.
06. Does my Company need to file for AGM as there is little business or my company is dormant for the year?
Yes. You will still need to file for AGM with ACRA. Filing of AGM with ACRA is compulsory for both active and dormant companies. There is no exemption from filing of AGM.
07. What happens if I do not file or file late with ACRA?
Late filing will attract late filing penalties imposed by ACRA.
The penalty fee range from $60 to $700 per late filing. The actual penalty amount is essentially dependent on how late you are. As such, it is STRONGLY ADVISED that you allow us to help you file on time to avoid such unnecessary costs. For severe cases of non-compliance or non-filing, ACRA reserves the right to issue the Directors of the Company with a Court Order. Once convicted, you may need to pay significantly more fines and risk getting disqualified to act as a director of any Singapore Companies.
08. I am already late for my AGM Filing. Can ContactOne Professional Services assist me in the filing?
Yes, we are still able to help with your AGM filing. However, for late filing, we will need to collect an estimated late filing penalty from you prior to the actual filing.
09. I have not done any bookkeeping during the year. Can ContactOne Professional Services help me now?
If you have not done any bookkeeping at all throughout the year, you will need to start preparing NOW! ContactOne Professional Services is able to assist you in your bookkeeping matters if you have all the transaction records in place. Please note that the documents should generally be organized appropriately to minimize accounting errors. As a guide, you should organize your transaction records into different Files or Sections in the below categories:
1. Bank Statements for EVERY MONTH of the FINANCIAL YEAR
2. Sales Records for the Year
3. Purchase and Expenditure Records for the Year
4. Directors’ Claims and Expenses incurred on behalf of the Company (Not yet paid out by the Company back to the directors)
5. Payroll records
6. Fixed Asset Purchases
The general idea is to be as organized as possible to facilitate easy tracking on both your side as well as from the accountant’s point of view. Please note that late requests for bookkeeping services may attract a fee premium or may be politely declined.
10. Do I still need to pay ContactOne Professional Services a fee for the filing?
You need not pay us addition fees before we file for your Company’s AGM except if:
1. Your secretary service period has expired and you have yet to made payment for renewal.
2. Penalty fees levied for late filings need to be collected prior to such filings.
3. In the event your accounts need to be submitted to ACRA, you may opt to use our XBRL conversion services at a service fee to help you convert your financial statements to XBRL Reporting format for such filing purposes.
The information contained herein, as prepared by ContactOne Professional Services Pte. Ltd. (“ContactOne PS”), is for a general nature only and has no regard to any needs or circumstances of any specific recipient, entity or individual. This document is for the exclusive use of the recipient to whom ContactOne PS delivers this document to. The information of this document are prepared on a “best-effort” basis and there can be no guarantee that such information is accurate as of the date received or that it will continue to be accurate in the future. ContactOne PS accepts no liability for any errors or for any loss to any recipient, entity or individual by reliance on the information contained in this document.