Singapore’s Public Service Division (PSD) is giving its 85,000 civil servants a year-end annual variable component (AVC) of one month's pay next month.

It is reported that lower-wage civil servants will receive a minimum year-end bonus of S$1,800 in accordance with the government’s loyalty to helping lower-wage workers.  It is announced that about 1,380 lower-wage civil servants will benefit from the minimum AVC scheme.

The bonus amount has been decided after consultation with public sector unions and the forecast of Ministry of Trade and Industry’s (MTI) on Singapore’s economic growth. The MTI had earlier forecast that the nation’s economy would grow by 3 percent to 3.5 percent in 2018. The association also projected that the labor market would continue to boost in the first half of the year.

Yeo Chun Fing, General Secretary, Amalgamated Union of Public Employees (AUPE) shared in media, “The agreement between the Public Service unions and the Public Service Division to award a one month year-end AVC, making a total of 1.5 months for the whole year, is reasonable given the steady performance of the economy which was anchored on the good growth in the first two quarters and the expected growth for the whole of 2018. Our union members would be quite satisfied with this payout.”

Together with the mid-year AVC of 0.5 months given in July, and what is commonly known as the 13th-month payment in December, civil servants will receive a total payout of 2.5 months this year.

In July this year, civil servants also received a one-off lump sum payment of $300, with a higher lump sum of $500 for lower-wage civil servants in Grades IV and V of the Operations Support Scheme.