Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management

The Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management (TADM) is Singapore's advisory and mediation service for employment disputes and selected payment disputes. It was jointly established in April 2017 by the Ministry of Manpower (MOM), National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) and Singapore National Employers Federation (SNEF). TADM is one of the specialist agencies under Tripartite Alliance Limited (TAL), alongside TAFEP and the Workplace Safety and Health Council. Its core role is to help parties resolve disputes through advice, negotiation and mediation; it is not the Employment Claims Tribunals (ECT), which adjudicate eligible unresolved claims (MOM, Tripartite set-ups and initiatives, accessed 20 October 2026; TAL, About TAL, accessed 20 October 2026).

What TADM handles and who may use the route

TADM's statutory mediation route commonly covers salary-related employment claims—such as unpaid salary, overtime or notice pay—and wrongful-dismissal claims that fall within the Employment Claims Act (ECA) and its schedules. An employer may bring a claim for salary in lieu of notice. Claim eligibility depends on the claimant's legal status, the claim type and the applicable statute: MOM lists statutory salary claims for employees covered by the Employment Act, Retirement and Re-employment Act or Child Development Co-Savings Act, while some contractual salary claims exclude domestic workers, public servants and seafarers. Wrongful-dismissal claims also have coverage rules. Do not assume every workplace grievance or contract payment automatically qualifies for an ECT claim (MOM, Managing employment disputes at TADM, accessed 20 October 2026; Employment Claims Act 2016, Singapore Statutes Online, accessed 20 October 2026).

TADM also gives advisory support where a dispute is not covered by employment legislation, and may offer voluntary mediation in appropriate cases. Self-employed persons and platform workers with service-fee disputes may approach TADM for advice, but the guide also points them to sector agencies, union support and the Small Claims Tribunals; this is not the same route as an employee's statutory salary claim. Domestic workers, seafarers and public officers may have different agency or employer channels. TADM's current guide identifies these exclusions and alternatives, so a person's worker classification must be checked before applying the employee deadlines or assuming the ECT has jurisdiction (TADM, Mediation guide, accessed 20 October 2026; MOM, Managing employment disputes at TADM, accessed 20 October 2026).

How mediation leads—or does not lead—to the ECT

For many cases, the current process starts with online e-Negotiation: the parties exchange proposals through TADM's platform, generally over five working days. If the case remains unresolved, a mediator conducts online or in-person mediation. TADM describes the mediation stage as taking about eight weeks and potentially involving multiple sessions; that is a process estimate, not a guaranteed resolution time. Lawyers cannot represent parties during statutory mediation under the ECA, subject to the Act's specific rules for authorised representatives and other exceptional circumstances (TADM, process on the ODR portal, updated 31 July 2026 and accessed 20 October 2026; TADM, Mediation guide, accessed 20 October 2026; Employment Claims Act 2016, Singapore Statutes Online, accessed 20 October 2026).

If the parties agree, TADM may issue a settlement agreement. Registration with the ECT can make the agreement a legally binding order; an unregistered private discussion should not be described as an ECT judgment. If mediation fails, the mediator may issue a Claim Referral Certificate (CRC), which allows the unresolved specified claim to be filed at the ECT within the statutory period. The ECT—not TADM—then hears and determines the claim. A CRC is a procedural gateway, not a ruling that the claimant has proved the case. Conversely, settlement through mediation is consensual and does not mean TADM has decided liability (see employment law and work culture for the wider employment-law setting).

What 2024 outcomes do—and do not—show

MOM and TADM's Employment Standards Report gives a dated view of outcomes, not a promise about an individual case. For salary claims lodged in 2024, 90% were resolved at TADM and the remaining 10% were referred to the ECT. Separately, 94% of employees with salary claims fully recovered their salaries with assistance from TADM and the ECT together. These figures answer different questions: one describes where claims were resolved, while the other describes full recovery across both stages. The report also recorded 71% of wrongful-dismissal claims resolved at TADM. “Resolved at TADM” does not necessarily mean an employer was found liable; the report says many such cases involved employers having met their obligations or claims being withdrawn after mediation (MOM and TADM, Employment Standards Report 2024, published 26 August 2025).

The report's 2024 incidence measures use a different denominator again: 2.63 salary claims and 0.46 wrongful-dismissal claims per 1,000 employees. They are annual claim-incidence rates, not percentages of employees with unpaid wages or workplace disputes. The observations below preserve the reference year, claimant population and denominator so that outcome rates are not mistaken for current eligibility, mediation effectiveness guarantees or legal thresholds (MOM and TADM, Employment Standards Report 2024, published 26 August 2025).

Deadlines, limits and the boundary with enforcement

The filing clock is short and differs by claim. MOM's current guidance says statutory or contractual salary claims generally must be filed within one year after the dispute arose if the employee remains employed, or within six months after the last day of work if employment has ended. A non-maternity wrongful-dismissal claim generally must be filed within one month after the last day of work; the maternity-related route has a separate deadline tied to confinement. These are filing deadlines for different claim categories, not a single universal “TADM deadline”; the current statute and TADM guide should be checked against the person's facts before relying on a date (MOM, Managing employment disputes at TADM, accessed 20 October 2026; TADM, Mediation guide, accessed 20 October 2026).

As stated by MOM on 20 October 2026, the ECT claim limit is generally S$20,000, rising to S$30,000 for claims through the Tripartite Mediation Framework or qualifying union-assisted mediation—the qualifying union/tripartite route. A claimant whose amount exceeds the applicable limit must abandon the excess to use that route. These are limits for settlement agreements under the ECA or ECT jurisdiction, not a general ceiling on every private employment claim. TADM's mediation/advisory role is also distinct from MOM's labour-law enforcement: MOM may investigate breaches and take enforcement action, while the ECT adjudicates claims referred after mediation. For individual advice about rights or evidence, consult a lawyer or an appropriate legal-assistance service; this overview is procedural information, not legal advice (MOM, Managing employment disputes at TADM, accessed 20 October 2026; TADM, Mediation guide, accessed 20 October 2026).