Singapore’s Workplace Fairness Act (WFA) 2025 marks the most significant shift in employment law since the Fair Consideration Framework was introduced in 2014. For the first time, the Tripartite Guidelines on Fair Employment Practices are being elevated from soft guidelines into statutory obligations — meaning violations can now result in court-imposed penalties rather than merely a referral to the Ministry of Manpower. With commencement expected by end-2027, employers have a window of roughly 18 months to align their hiring practices, internal policies, and grievance-handling procedures with the new law.
This guide covers what the WFA requires of employers, which characteristics are protected under the Workplace Fairness Act Singapore 2025, how the new Workplace Fairness Tribunal works, and the concrete steps HR teams should be taking now.
Background: From Guidelines to Statute
Singapore has operated a system of fair employment guidelines since the Tripartite Alliance for Fair and Progressive Employment Practices (TAFEP) was established in 2006. These guidelines covered merit-based hiring, fair appraisal, and the prohibition of discriminatory job advertisements. Compliance was encouraged but not legally enforceable; employers found in breach faced MOM referrals and, in serious cases, restrictions on work pass applications.
The WFA changes this fundamentally. Following a tripartite committee review, Parliament passed the Workplace Fairness Act 2025 on 8 January 2025 and the companion Workplace Fairness (Dispute Resolution) Act 2025 on 4 November 2025. Together, the two Acts create a statutory right for employees to bring workplace discrimination claims before a tribunal or court, with legally enforceable remedies. Per the Ministry of Manpower, the overarching aim is to build fair and harmonious workplaces where employment decisions are made on merit.
Which Characteristics Are Protected Under the Workplace Fairness Act Singapore 2025?
The WFA protects workers from adverse employment decisions based on five categories of characteristics. “Adverse employment decision” is defined broadly to cover hiring, appraisal, promotion, training, and dismissal:
- Age
- Nationality
- Sex, marital status, pregnancy status, and caregiving responsibilities
- Race, religion, and language ability
- Disability and mental health conditions
The practical implication: a job advertisement that specifies a preferred nationality (other than where justified by genuine operational requirements, such as a verified language requirement), a promotion decision that disadvantages a pregnant employee, or a dismissal that appears linked to a mental health disclosure — all may attract WFA liability from end-2027.
The Tripartite Guidelines on Fair Employment Practices (TGFEP) will continue to address characteristics not covered by the WFA, including educational institution attended and physical appearance. Employers should treat both instruments as complementary rather than alternative obligations.
How the WFA Interacts with COMPASS
The WFA adds a statutory anti-discrimination layer on top of, rather than replacing, the existing COMPASS framework for Employment Pass applications. COMPASS includes a nationality diversity criterion that scores firms on the concentration of any single nationality in their professional workforce. This criterion is explicitly retained under the WFA — diversity in hiring remains a positive policy objective. However, a blanket “no [nationality]” hiring policy would be prohibited under the WFA even if it would improve a firm’s COMPASS score.
Employer Obligations Under the Workplace Fairness Act Singapore 2025
Fair Recruitment Practices
Employers must adopt merit-based hiring that evaluates candidates on relevant qualifications and experience rather than any protected characteristic. Job advertisements must not specify or imply preferences based on protected characteristics. “Mandarin-speaking preferred” is permissible only where language ability is genuinely required for the role; “local Chinese preferred” is not. Interview processes must document evaluation criteria and apply them consistently across all candidates.
For employers of Employment Pass holders in Singapore, note that a WFA breach affecting local candidates who were passed over in favour of an EP applicant could trigger both a WFA enforcement action and a COMPASS Fair Consideration Framework penalty. The two regimes reinforce each other.
Mandatory Grievance Handling
One of the most operationally significant WFA requirements is the mandatory internal grievance-handling process. Employers must: (1) put in place documented procedures for handling workplace discrimination complaints; (2) inform employees of how to raise a grievance and how it will be handled; (3) conduct a proper inquiry into any complaint received; and (4) communicate the outcome of the inquiry to the affected employee in writing.
Unlike the current TGFEP guidelines — which encouraged grievance mechanisms as best practice — the WFA makes these steps a legal requirement. Failure to have or follow such a process will be relevant to both the finding of liability and the quantum of any penalty imposed by the Employment Claims Tribunal.
Small Employer Provisions
Businesses with fewer than 25 employees are expected to be subject to a lighter-touch regime at commencement. The Government has indicated this is to give smaller employers time to build HR capacity. However, the subsidiary legislation confirming precise exemptions has not yet been published. Employers in this category should not assume full exemption and should track MOM’s commencement orders closely as 2027 approaches.
The New Workplace Fairness Tribunal
Once the WFA commences, employees who believe they have been subject to workplace discrimination follow a structured escalation pathway. They must first attempt resolution through the employer’s internal grievance process. If unresolved, they must undergo mandatory mediation with an independent mediator — this is a pre-condition to any litigation. If mediation fails, they may bring a claim before the Employment Claims Tribunal (ECT) for claims up to SGD 250,000, or the General Division of the High Court for higher-value claims.
The ECT already handles salary-related employment disputes; the WFA adds workplace discrimination claims to its jurisdiction. For HR professionals, this means that inadequate documentation of hiring and appraisal decisions carries real litigation risk from end-2027.
WFA Compliance Checklist for HR Teams
With roughly 18 months before commencement, here is a prioritised action plan:
Audit your job advertisements. Review all live and template postings for language that could imply preferences based on nationality, age, sex, disability, or religion. Update them now — do not wait for commencement.
Document your hiring criteria. For every role, ensure written evaluation criteria are on file. In any future WFA claim, the absence of documentation is not neutral evidence.
Establish a formal grievance procedure. If you do not have one, build it before commencement. TAFEP has published employer guides with templates and checklists as part of its pre-commencement readiness programme.
Train hiring managers. Structured interviews with role-relevant questions and standardised scoring reduce both unconscious bias and legal exposure. This training also supports fair consideration obligations under the EP application framework.
Review termination records. Terminations that occurred proximate to a protected event — pregnancy announcement, age-related health disclosure, nationality change due to a citizenship application — should be reviewed for documentation quality.
For employers managing both local and foreign headcount, the Local Qualifying Salary increase to S$1,800 from 1 July 2026 is a separate but parallel compliance deadline with immediate financial implications. Employers facing both WFA preparation and LQS adjustment are managing two distinct compliance tracks simultaneously.
Connecting the WFA to Singapore’s Broader Employment Framework
The WFA sits alongside and complements: the Fair Consideration Framework, which requires employers with 10 or more employees to advertise vacancies on MyCareersFuture before submitting EP applications; COMPASS, which incentivises nationality and skills diversity in EP hiring; and the TGFEP, which remains in force for characteristics outside the WFA’s five categories.
For companies reviewing their overall HR and immigration posture — particularly around EP applications, S Pass quota management, or PR sponsorships — our team at Singapore Employment Agency can help structure compliant, defensible hiring processes as a MOM-licensed employment agency (Licence 19C9790). For corporate secretarial and governance matters related to your Singapore entity, Raffles Corporate Services provides end-to-end compliance support.
— The Editorial Team, Little Big Employment Agency