APEC Business Travel Card
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The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Business Travel Card is a scheme designed to facilitate the movement of business travellers between APEC member economies.
Singapore citizens may apply for the card if they do not have any past criminal convictions, and are:
- A bona fide business person representing an economically active business entity; or
- A member of a professional body (for example, a doctor, lawyer or accountant); or
- A public officer representing a ministry, government department, economic agency or statutory board, travelling in official capacity.
Singapore citizens with a valid passport and the issued APEC Business Travel Card (ABTC) may use the ABTC as a multiple-journey visa that enables expedited immigration clearance through designated lanes in the following participating economies:
|
Australia |
Brunei Darussalam |
Chile |
|
Chinese Taipei |
Hong Kong, China |
Indonesia |
|
Japan |
Malaysia |
Mexico |
|
New Zealand |
Papua New Guinea |
People's Republic of China |
|
Peru |
Republic of Korea |
Russia |
|
Singapore |
Thailand |
The Philippines |
|
Viet Nam |
||
| The United States (US) and Canada are transitional economies in the ABTC scheme, and are not printed at the back of the ABTC. | ||
If you travel to the US or Canada with an ABTC, you will be subjected to the standard immigration clearance processes; however, you may use ‘fast track’ immigration lanes (currently designated for airline crew) at major international airports*.
*The designated airports in Canada are:
- Calgary International Airport
- Edmonton International Airport
- Halifax Stanfield International Airport
- Montréal–Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport
- Ottawa Macdonald–Cartier International Airport
- Toronto Pearson International Airport (Terminals 1 and 2)
- Vancouver International Airport
- Winnipeg James Armstrong Richardson International Airport.
You will need to provide original documents and official translations (for documents in languages other than English), as well as copies of the documents for ICA to retain.
ICA accepts:
ICA does not endorse any private translation companies or entities. Insufficient documentation may result in non-acceptance of your application. You may be required to provide additional documents to support your application.
You will need the following to apply for an ABTC using e-Service:
- Your recent passport-sized, digital, colour photograph taken within the last three months. Please see Photo Guidelines for information on photo requirements.
- Scanned signature image file:- in JPEG format ('jpg' extension) - Preferred dimension of 250 x 220 pixels - File size of less than 60 KBytes
- Scanned copy of a letter of authorisation or support from the organisation:- in JPEG format ('jpg' extension) or PDF format - File size of less than 1 MB (sample supporting document)- If the letter of support is self-signed, please provide a scanned copy of your ACRA Business Profile
- For members of professional bodies who are applying for the ABTC in their personal capacity, a letter stating the reason for application, along with proof of membership from the professional body must be provided
- If you are applying as part of an overseas company, you must submit a scanned copy of the company's overseas business registration certificate written in any of the four official languages (English, Mandarin, Tamil or Malay).
- Valid Singapore passport.
Login to our e-Service using your Singpass 2FA to complete the online application form.
If your ABTC has expired or there is a change in your passport details, you would need to submit a new application online. If your passport is expiring, or you have a pending passport application, please apply for a new ABTC after you have collected your replacement passport.
A non-refundable S$100 fee is payable.
Payment can be made using either:
- Visa or MasterCard credit/debit card
- American Express (AMEX) credit card
- Internet Direct Debit (DBS/POSB, OCBC, UOB and Standard Chartered Bank internet banking accounts in Singapore)
- PayNow.
You may wish to save your receipt after you have made payment, as it will not be emailed to you automatically.
If your ABTC application meets the eligibility for approval, it will be sent to the APEC economies for their pre-clearance. Majority of applications take up to four months for full preclearance. For your convenience, ICA will issue you the ABTC about four months from the date of your application, based on the APEC economies that have cleared your application. If there are economies that submit their returns later, ICA will incorporate these additional economies in a final ABTC that will be issued to you about nine months after your application. Please note that foreign APEC economies are unlikely to process your application beyond the nine-month mark.
If your ABTC application meets the eligibility for approval, it will be sent to the APEC economies for their pre-clearance. You may subsequently check the pre-clearance status of your application via https://www.abtc-aps.org/abtc-core/status/check.html, about 4 weeks after your initial ABTC application. When checking, do select “Singapore” as the Economy of Application and key in the applicant’s passport number (all CAPS). A list of the member economies which have approved your travel will be displayed.