How to Claim Phone Expenses in Singapore (2026 Guide)

Quick answer

Singapore is more generous than most countries on phone costs: employees can claim, not only businesses. The catch is the measurement. IRAS wants the cost attributable to work, and for working from home it accepts a simple proxy, the difference between the bills before and after. This guide covers employee claims, the before-and-after method, sole traders, GST and records. Rules are from IRAS in the Sources section, retrieved 10 October 2026.

Employees: what counts

Employment expenses are those wholly and exclusively incurred in producing your employment income, and to be allowable they must be incurred for your official duties, not reimbursed by your employer, and not capital or private in nature ^[1] . If your employer requires you to work from home and doesn’t reimburse the extra telecommunication charges, you can claim the work part against your employment income for the year ^[1] . A reimbursed phone bill can’t be claimed again.

The before-and-after method

Because it’s hard to measure exactly how much of a phone bill comes from working at home, IRAS accepts a proxy: compare the bills before and after working from home and claim the difference ^[1] . IRAS’s own example uses electricity at $50 before and $60 after, a $10 claim, and the same approach applies to telecommunication charges ^[1] . If more than one person in the household works from home, IRAS accepts an equal split of the shared costs between them ^[1] . Installation or connection fees are capital and can’t be claimed ^[1] .

Worked example: a marketing manager’s mobile bill averaged $55 a month before her employer required her to work from home and $72 after. She claims $17 a month, or $204 for a full year, as employment expenses. A colleague on an unchanged $60 flat plan has no increase and claims nothing.

Sole traders and partnerships

IRAS lists telephone bills among allowable business expenses, which must be incurred wholly and exclusively to produce business income ^[2] . A plan used for both business and private calls is apportioned on a reasonable basis, such as call and data logs, and only the business share is deducted ^[2] . A line used only for the business is deducted in full. A new handset is a capital purchase claimed through capital allowances, which give a one-year write-off for computers and low-value assets of $5,000 or less each, within a $30,000 yearly cap ^[3] .

Worked example: a private tutor’s $85 monthly plan runs about 60% business by usage. The deduction is $85 × 12 × 60% = $612 for the year.

GST

GST is 9% ^[4] . A GST-registered business claims the input tax on the business share of its phone costs, supported by a tax invoice, or a simplified tax invoice where the amount is $1,000 or less ^[5] . GST on the private share isn’t claimable.

Records

Keep the bills before and after working from home, a note of when your employer required you to work from home, and for apportionment, the usage evidence behind the percentage. The record-keeping guide covers retention periods.

Common mistakes

• Claiming a phone bill your employer reimbursed ^[1] .
• Claiming a percentage of a flat plan that didn’t increase when you started working from home ^[1] .
• Claiming installation or connection fees as an employee ^[1] .
• A sole trader deducting a whole family plan ^[2] .
• Claiming input tax on the private share ^[5] .

Software that helps

ExpenseFlow captures phone bills by email, upload or photo, codes each line with a tax code and a written reason, and can apply a fixed business-use percentage you configure for the phone account so the same share is used every month. It syncs to Xero or QuickBooks Online after approval. It doesn’t prepare your personal tax return.