Dang... V2 got locked. Missed the chance to overtake the O&G thread by only a hundred plus posts. Well done, chaps.

Bragging rights, I guess. Like having the tallest twin towers in the world,.. absolutely useless but hey, it's the tallest twin towers in the world.

Anyway, was just a little bit cheesed that no one asked the rest of the folks in the V2 thread if they wanted to move to V3 or not. That time of the month...

Annex A to Form 4A is enough. What more can your current employer testify about you?


No need. I applied for PR 3 months after arriving in Sg... so I didn't have anything from IRAS, no previous employer etc etc. In Annex A, your current employer already states how much your current salary is. But I guess there's no harm if you want to submit your tax assessment as well.

I only submitted copies of the following with my application.

Explanatory Note Item #7
(a) passport
© work pass
(d) educational and professional certs
(f) birth cert

Just out of curiosity, how many of you knew early on that you can go through the auto clearance gates at Sg immigration using only our Malaysian passports?

I only found out last Thursday night at Tuas immigration. Seems like I bodoh-bodoh wasted over 4 years queuing at the manual clearance counters when there was no need to. I wonder why the immigration officers never once made a remark or asked me why I didn't use the auto clearance gates instead.

You can access your CPF account if you have a Singpass. Actually Singpass will let you access quite a lot of govt portals, for eg your library record or immigration etc.

Just google for Singpass and you'll find a dedicated govt website teaching you how to apply for it.

This post has been edited by seantang: May 24 2009, 09:54 AM

I don't think you have to translate any documents from Malaysia. After all, bahasa is one of the official languages in Singapore and not a 'foreign language'.

For the Ipohites in Singapore, Firefly will be commencing one flight a day on 1,3,5,7 between SIN & IPH starting July 12. One way is around RM90 fare + RM80 tax. Beats the 8 hour bus ride, if you ask me.

We asked for this. Now that it's here, we'd better support it.

This post has been edited by seantang: May 28 2009, 10:55 AM

Ya, SIN-Subang flights are starting very soon, early June / next week if I'm not wrong.

For me, flying is a no-brainer. Buses between Ipoh & Sg takes 8 hours and always starts at 10am or 10pm. You have to choose between wasting a day of annual leave on the bus, or becoming a zombie the next morning (or again waste your holiday sleeping it off).

This is a god-send. I can go back to Ipoh two weekends each month and only use up 1 day of annual leave (ie. 2 half days on Friday to catch the afternoon flight). In fact, I can go back every weekend and only use 2 days leave.

Good one

It's actually a very cun one for us, cos it's right in the middle of town... like seriously in the middle of town. About 10 minutes from town center and 10 minutes from the major suburbs of Ipoh Gdn, Canning Gdn, Bercham etc. It's actually easier for me to get to the airport than to the bus station.

Do you need to 'deal' with them? If you really feel you have to respond... tease them back about earning less than half of what you do, and still pay more tax to build mosques and MARA colleges. Smart...

This post has been edited by seantang: May 30 2009, 01:48 AM

But Melaka is only 3 hours from Singapore by bus. After you factor in the time you spend checking in and waiting in the departure hall, flying won't save you much time.

Ummm, my hometown's in Ipoh... whatever you can describe... been there, done that, and literally doing it tomorrow. Only the Penang and Alor Setar folks are one up when it comes to road trips from Singapore.

Btw, any of you folks thinking of buying a car? I'm thinking the Kia Cerato Forte as an OPC to drive home. Should be around 25K.

This post has been edited by seantang: May 30 2009, 06:57 PM

I should have bought a lot of shares as well... but as the Cantonese say "yau cho chi, mou hak yee".

I could see all the stock markets crash end of last year, early this year as well... just like COE a few months ago. But the point being, did you think it was a V shaped crash or L shape or U shape? I expected COEs to stay around 1-2K for a few more months as dealers slash prices to move inventory. I thought I could wait. Obviously, I've been wrong so far.

But then again, 3-6 months ago I was less secure at work than now. So although COE was zero, I wasn't considering a car because I didn't know how long more I'd be in Sg.

Generally 10%, I think. But you need to do some detailed research because there are a lot of variables involved... like if it's new, whether you're buying first time, if resale.. how much is the amount over valuation, whether you take HDB or bank loan, your CPF balance in the different accounts, whether you qualify for HDB grants etc.

Nobody here will be able to give you any numbers without having to work through the different scenarios on your behalf.

This post has been edited by seantang: May 31 2009, 07:55 PM

Should be interesting, but museums and the arts in Singapore tend to be disappointing if you've ever been to one of the established exhibits or shows in US and Europe, or even Australia and China.

I've been to the National Museum of Singapore, Singapore Art Museum, Peranakan Museum, Science Center, Discovery Center, 1497 Exhibition and watched Phantom at the Esplanade... each time I ended up walking away thinking "damn, I paid money for that?"...

This post has been edited by seantang: Jun 3 2009, 12:05 AM

That's the same price as a ticket to the Louvre. The Summer Palace is half that. The Smithsonian is free.

Do you have a degree? MICPA, ICPAS or Australian/US CPA?


So, you're just going to walk up to their offices? You have at least sent a resume in and been called for an interview, right?

COEs up again this month... shucks...

I do want to get a car, sick of buses and trains esp going back home. Anyway, I think the COE is spiking prematurely just like the stock markets.

And with SIN-IPH flights, I can wait a while and see what happens.

---

Added on June 4, 2009, 9:45 am
A degree plus professional qualification should put you on equal footing with most Sg accounting graduate job seekers. If your Big4 experience is solid, I think the opportunities are still there as you'll edge out the freshies and those coming from smaller firms.

However, if you don't send in your resume first, how are you going to get interviews?


This post has been edited by seantang: Jun 4 2009, 09:45 AM