When it was announced earlier this year that businesses would receive wage support and rental relief as Singapore battled the pandemic, it seemed like the right moves were being made, and I felt reassured.

However, the implementation was not as straightforward as it seemed. For the heightened alert period in May, businesses that did not automatically qualify for rental relief had to submit applications to the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore in August. Additional applications were also needed for the heightened alert periods that followed the one in May.

Due to the high volume of applications, my company received a reply only at the end of last month, six months after the restrictions had been imposed in May. This delay in support has already had a drastic impact on the company. Our application was rejected.

The reason given was that our business activities are situated in petrol stations. Such addresses are not classified by the Urban Redevelopment Authority as commercial developments, and thus we do not qualify according to the guidelines in place.

In my opinion, rental relief was denied us due to a technicality. We are operating as a retail outfit. We suffered no less than other retail operations. Why is it that they enjoy the support (automatically or otherwise) but not our business? Because of our listed address for operations? How can it be that a listed address takes precedence over the nature of business?

I wonder how many other businesses have had seemingly legitimate applications rejected.

Steve Er