Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) can continue receiving free advice from the Enterprise Development Centres (EDCs) and the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) on the Productivity and Innovation Credit (PIC) scheme at the third run of the PIC Clinics.  The EDCs are supported by SPRING to serve the business needs of SMEs.

Introduced in 2010, the PIC scheme provides businesses with tax benefits for investing in a broad range of productivity improvement and innovation activities.

The PIC Clinics started in 2011. So far some 700 SMEs have received help. An SME which benefitted from the clinics is Sin Leong Lee Coffee Pte Ltd, a coffee powder manufacturer. Mr Ng Han Hoe, Director of Sin Leong Lee Coffee said, “Coffee roasting is a traditional and manual process. The clinic showed us how we could tap the PIC scheme to automate our processes. The upgrading has helped us reduce manual labour and cut the production time from 45 minutes to 15 minutes.”

The PIC Clinics will be held every Thursday from 17 Jan to 27 Jun 2013. The sessions will be held at IRAS and the five EDCs located at ASME ^[1], SCCCI ^[2], SICCI ^[3], SMCCI ^[4]  and SMF ^[5]. We expect 500 SMEs to attend these clinics.

During the one-to-one sessions, EDC advisors and IRAS officers will be on-hand to help SMEs understand the PIC tax incentive, how it works and how to claim. SMEs can bring the relevant financial information or expenses for the advisors to assess if they qualify for the PIC scheme.

The first clinic is held at IRAS today. SMEs interested to learn more about PIC and how to benefit from the scheme can sign up for the clinics at  www.spring.gov.sg/PIC-CLINIC. At the clinics, SMEs may also find out about other government assistance schemes and how they can benefit from them.

SPRING Singapore, Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore