The Singapore Law Gazette

Starting Your Own Practice

How to Save Money and Time

Congratulations if you have decided to start your own practice. Whether you are flying solo, or partnering a few others, chances are neither of you have done it before. Starting a new practice is like having a baby for the first time: there is uncertainty over what needs to be done in this vulnerable phase of your newborn’s life. Not to mention the money that needs to be spent for the newborn’s sustenance. Fret not. In this article, the Small Law Firms Committee shares their 1^st-hand experience on how you can tide over this vulnerable phase by minimising costs, as well as leveraging on government subsidies and precedents.

Rental

At the top of your head is where you will be working from. Rental is a significant overhead if you desire to lease a physical office solely for your practice’s use. You may want to forego a traditional physical office for now and use a virtual, serviced or co-sharing office in the meantime. These three terms are often used interchangeably, though there are differences between them.

Virtual Office

When you rent a virtual office, you rent only an address. Mails get delivered to this address. Physically, you and your staff are not in the office. If you need to be physically present to meet clients, the virtual office provider may have a meeting room for you to use (subject to a fee).

Serviced Office

In contrast, a serviced office is closer in idea to the traditional physical office: you are renting physical space, not just an address. But the space your practice occupies is much smaller, for e.g. a table or a private room – as opposed to the entire office. The majority of the office space – the pantry, meeting rooms, reception/waiting area, work desks – are shared. Internet access, cleaning, mail collecting and provision of tables and chairs (if you are renting a private room) are usually included in your package price. The more expensive serviced offices may also help you to answer your phone calls and post letters.

A co-working space (or hot-desking) is a subset of a serviced office: less privacy because the space you work in is in the open. You may have a desk dedicated to you and your staff, or you may use any desk available at designated time slots.

Co-sharing Office

Last in the list is the co-sharing office where two or more entities co-share an office used by an existing tenant. Unlike a serviced office, the overall office space is not administered by a commercial entity like JustCo, Regus or Wework. Rather, a co-sharing arrangement is akin to a sub-tenancy arrangement where you (as a sub-tenant) may rent space in an office used by an existing tenant. It is not unheard of for small law practices to co-share a large office space in order to reduce the rent that each has to pay.

At this point, we pause and answer a couple of FAQs you may have:

Q: Can I use my residential address as my practice’s registered office?

A: Yes, you may,¹Ministry of Law and Legal Services Regulatory Authority, ‘Use Of Residential And Non-Residential Addresses’ (December 2021) <https://www.mlaw.gov.sg/files/Use%20of%20Residential%20and%20Non-Residential%20addresses.pdf> accessed 12 October 2023. provided approval from the HDB or URA is obtained.

Q: Can I co-share an office with a non-law practice?

A: Yes, you may as this is a co-sharing office arrangement mentioned in [6].²Ministry of Law, ‘Approval To Share Premises’ (6 December 2021) <https://www.mlaw.gov.sg/law-practice-entities-and-lawyers/approval-to-share-premises/> accessed 12 October 2023. But you have to comply with the relevant rules governing the use of shared premises (see [8] below).

Relevant rules governing use of shared premises as your practice’s registered office

If you wish to share premises with another entity – whether a law practice or not – you must ensure that your practice:³Supra note 2.

1. Preserves its professional independence, by keeping itself separate and distinct from the other entity;
2. Is clearly identified as separate and distinct from the other entity;
3. Safeguards its clients’ confidential information by preventing unauthorised access by the other entity; and
4. Complies with the rules governing law practices as set out in the Legal Profession Act and its subsidiary legislation.⁴See in particular, Rule 81.

In relation to [9(d)], Rule 81 of the Legal Profession (Law Practice Entities) Rules 2015 requires you to seek prior approval from the Legal Services Regulatory Authority (LSRA) if you intend to use premises shared with entities who are non-law practices. You will be required to submit to LSRA the following documents⁵Supra note 1.:

SN	Office option	Documents needed
	Virtual office	An undertaking that your practice will restrict access to, and maintain the confidentiality of, clients’ files, court documents and information at the premises. (Note: You may refer to Precedent A via this link (requires member’s login; click “Practice Matters” > “Small Law Firms”) and modify it for your own use.) The office provider’s written acknowledgment of your practice’s obligations. (You may refer to Precedent B via this link (requires member’s login; click “Practice Matters > “Small Law Firms”)
	Serviced office	Floor plan of the premises layout with the necessary mark-ups (Please get it from your office provider. The plan should mark-up the areas that are exclusive to your practice, and areas which are shared.) An undertaking that your practice will restrict access to, and maintain the confidentiality of, clients’ files, court documents and information at the premises. (You may refer to Precedent A via this link (requires member’s login; click “Practice Matters” > “Small Law Firms”). The office provider’s written acknowledgment of your practice’s obligations (You may refer to Precedent B via this link (requires member’s login; click “Practice Matters” > “Small Law Firms”).
	Co-sharing office
	Use of residential address as your practice’s registered office	An undertaking that your practice will restrict access to, and maintain the confidentiality of, clients’ files, court documents and information at the residential address. Separate approvals from HDB and URA.

Whichever option you choose – whether it is a virtual office, serviced service, co-sharing office or your residential address – you are responsible for your own compliance. Use your professional judgment to decide if the option you choose is suitable. For instance, a serviced office package that only provides hot-desking facilities will not suffice because other “hot-deskers” will be able to hear or see your client’s confidential information when you talk to clients at your desk, or when your documents are placed on your desk.

Government Subsidies – Recruitment

Rental aside, the next major overhead will be staff salaries. As a new business owner, you want to minimise the risk (as well as the cost) of hiring an employee who is the wrong fit. The traditional method of selecting staff based on interviews has its flaws because the candidate who performed well at the interview may not perform as well on the job.

We introduce two recruitment schemes – both subsidised by the government – which allow you to select staff based on job performance, rather than interview performance.

Career Trial

As the name suggests, a Career Trial allows the law practice and the prospective candidate to go through a short-term trial before formal employment. Use the trial to gauge whether the candidate is a good fit for your practice without having to commit to a formal employment relationship. The trial may last for a few months during which the prospective candidate is given a training allowance that is paid for by the government. After the trial, if the candidate is offered formal employment with your practice, the candidate will be eligible for further monetary incentives, again paid for by the government.⁶Workforce Singapore, ‘Career Trial Factsheet’ (22 September 2023) <https://www.wsg.gov.sg/docs/default-source/programme/career-trial-factsheet74b30c5b-310d-4b63-abab-e664a70d0105.pdf?sfvrsn=d5e3a298_5> accessed 12 October 2023.

Do note that the prospective candidate has to be unemployed before the start of the Career Trial.⁷Supra note 6. You cannot use the Career Trial to poach star employees currently working in another law practice. Instead, you may want to use Career Trial to hire unemployed jobseekers (with or without experience working in a law practice) who demonstrate a hunger to learn, adapt and grow together your new practice.

If you are keen to sign up for the Career Trial or to know more about the details, please go to the Career Trial portal. You need to submit a Career Trial activities plan which will be used by Workforce Singapore to determine the duration of the trial. Do put some thought into this activities plan: if you want the trial to last longer, you have to include more meaningful activities into the plan. You may refer to Precedent C via this link (requires member’s login; click “Practice Matters” > “Small Law Firms”) which contains a sample activities plan that you may want to modify for your own use.

SGUnited Mid-Career Pathways Programme (SGUP)

Under this recruitment scheme, you may only select candidates who are 40 years old or above. Unlike the Career Trial, candidates for the SGUP need not be unemployed to be eligible. SGUP lasts between four to six months, during which the trainee is given a training allowance which ranges from $1,800 to $3,800. Seventy percent (70%) of the training allowance is paid for by the government.⁸Workforce Singapore, ‘SGUnited Mid-Career Pathways Programme (SGUP) for Host Organisations’ <https://www.wsg.gov.sg/home/employers-industry-partners/workforce-development-job-redesign/sgunited-mid-career-pathways-programme-for-host-organisations?gclid=Cj0KCQjwsp6pBhCfARIsAD3GZuaMxw54n-dr6_Hd4PO-q0Jlaoa2eOUcA37ntbUsdpbFJg2fuJk9SWwaAiOFEALw_wcB> accessed 12 October 2023. There appears to be no express condition that the candidate has to come from an industry other than the legal profession. But as its name suggests, this programme is targeted at candidates who previously worked in an industry other than the legal profession and are keen to cross over.

As with the Career Trial, the SGUP offers an opportunity for you to evaluate the candidate’s job performance, before committing to a formal employment relationship. But note that as a host organisation, your practice has to commit to convert the candidate into an employee after the programme, if the candidate’s performance is satisfactory.

If you are keen to sign up for this programme or to know more about the details, please go to the SGUP portal. To be eligible as a host organisation, you need to submit two documents (amongst others) – SGUP Attachment Details and the SGUP Development Plan – to show that you can provide the candidate with meaningful developmental opportunities during the attachment. You may refer to Precedents D and E via this link (requires member’s login; click “Practice Matters” > “Small Law Firms”) which respectively contains a sample SGUP Attachment Details and SGUP Development Plan. Please modify them for your own use.

Government Subsidies – Adoption of Legal Technology

What better time to adopt legal technology than during a newborn practice’s formative years! We understand that as a new business owner, you face financial constraints. But adopting legal technology is cheaper than you think. You may have heard of familiar names like Clio, Tessaract and most recently, the Legal Technology Platform⁹Read more about this latest initiative by MinLaw in this article: Chua Xin Xuan, ‘Levelling Up with the Legal Technology Platform’ (Singapore Law Gazette, May 2022) <https://lawgazette.com.sg/practice/tech-talk/levelling-up-with-the-legal-technology-platform/> accessed 12 October 2023.. These are names of softwares (aka IT solutions) that help you manage your files digitally (as opposed to physically). These softwares are not toys that only big practices can afford. Apply for the Productivity Solutions Grant (PSG) and you can get support of up to 70% of the qualifying cost of adopting these softwares.¹⁰Ministry of Law, ‘Supporting Singapore law firms in their digitalisation journey’ <https://ltpi.mlaw.gov.sg/funding/> accessed 12 October 2023. This 70% subsidy lasts you over two years, which is ideal for a startup where the first two years are often financially challenging.

The following is an outline of the steps you have to take to apply for the PSG grant:¹¹Ministry of Law, ‘Legal Tech Platform Initiative (LTPI) Funding Programme – FAQ’ at (7)<https://ltpi.mlaw.gov.sg/files/FAQs%20for%20LTP%20funding%20support.pdf> accessed 12 October 2023

1. Visit GoBusiness Gov Assist to see the list of supportable IT solutions and identify those you are interested in.
2. Obtain quotations from solution provider(s). IT solutions and solution providers have been pre-qualified under the grant.
3. You should not sign any contract or make any payment before submitting the PSG application.
4. Submit the PSG application on the Business Grants Portal (BGP) at www.businessgrants.gov.sg. You need a CorpPass account to transact on the BGP.

(If you prefer a more detailed step-by-step guide to apply for the PSG grant, click here.)

Precedents

So far, we have shared on how to save money. Now, we share on how to save time. Using existing precedents is a great way to leverage on the work already done by others before you. Further to the precedents cited above regarding use of shared office premises and application for government subsidies, there are other free precedents you can leverage on. For instance, as a Law Society member, you have free access to the “Members Library” (login required). In the library, go to Practice Matters > Small Law Firms. There, you can find many precedents – for instance letters of employment (if you want to hire a staff), court attendance notes, powers of attorney for HDB property and statutory declarations – that you can use.

For more practice-specific precedents, also check out the following links:

Model Legal Documents – Venture Capital Investment Model Agreements (VIMA) 2.0;

Forms for Winding Up Matters under the Insolvency, Restructuring and Dissolution Act 2018 as well as the Companies Act.

If you have money to spare, consider subscribing to Lexis Practical Guidance where there is a wide variety of templates sorted according to practice areas. If you know of another law practice who is interested, ask the vendor if the cost of subscription may be split between the two practices.

Conclusion

In this article, we have shared with you how you can save money, especially on the big-ticket items like rental, recruitment and technology adoption. We also shared how you can save time by providing you with precedents or links to precedents that you can leverage on. We hope you have found this article useful. Like a first-time parent, starting a new practice has its challenges which if surmounted, can be very satisfying. All the best!

Disclaimer: This resource guide should only be used as a point of reference and does not comprise legal advice. The Law Society shall not be held liable for any reliance on the information provided herein. Information provided is updated as of 13 October 2023.

Edward Tay
Ng Kwong Loong
See Wern Hao
Members of the Small Law Firms Committee 2024
Desmond Ong (2023 Member)